


Misconception

by GideonFluff



Category: Deus Ex (Video Games), Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Genre: Angry Mac is angry, Blue Balls, Body Dysphoria, Disobeying Orders, Drunken Shenanigans, Emotional Constipation, Fluff, Forced Bonding, Inappropriate Humor, Light Bondage, M/M, Matchmaking, Military Jargon, Military Mac is being military, Paperwork of Doom, Resolved Sexual Tension, Revenge will be had, Safeword Use, Scars, Sexual Tension, Teasing, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Touching, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-05
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-08-29 07:23:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 28,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8480758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GideonFluff/pseuds/GideonFluff
Summary: There is always tension but MacReady and Jensen manage to work around it while they are focused on their mission.In the offices of TF29 however there was no mission with immediate danger to focus on most of the time. That's where they clash and their co-workers are sick of it.Operation: Matchmaking is on.Note: Rating and tags will change according to how the story develops :)I don't want to spoil people too much with the tags or promise things that get edited later.STATUS: And award to the slowest writer goes tooo--*cough* Whoop de doo, stuff is in the works. Sorry about the wait :c





	1. Prologue

_Misconception_

 

While they had admittedly managed to stay civil with each other during the London mission, tension had been extremely high in TF29 after it. MacReady was very pleased with how Jensen had performed in that mission but he‘d been far less pleased to note that the agent still wouldn‘t join the training exercises he held in the small local gym.

 

They might not be mandatory, but they were important for team bonding. Not to mention that practice never hurt anyone. Stepping up behind Adam the older agent cleared his throat to get the aug‘s attention. „So, are you doing anything after hours?“

 

Jensen‘s shoulders had immediately tensed at hearing his team leader‘s voice behind him so suddenly and he sounded a bit wary. „I don‘t have any plans yet. Why are you asking?“

 

Mac sighed a little. This would be like trying to pull a cat‘s teeth without narcotics. „Figured I‘d invite ya to have a brew with me later, agent.“ The truth was, that him taking out Jensen for a couple of drinks was Miller‘s idea. But hell would freeze over before Duncan would admit that the old man had conned him into bringing out the reclusive social turtle for some r&r bonding time. Thinking back to that very awkward conversation he recalled what Jim had told him.

 

‚It‘s not like I‘m telling you to marry the guy, Mac! Think we both had enough of that anyway.. He just doesn‘t like to be in group outings since he‘s one of those silent introvert types. So if you want to bond with Jensen and get used to being around augmented people while you don‘t have a gun in your hand, you‘ll have to do it one-on-one.‘

 

Of course he knew that Miller was right. The director didn‘t just have a lot of field experience, Jim was also really good at balancing teams and had always managed to keep the peace in the units he lead. Probably because unlike Duncan he actually had a finely tuned sense of empathy.

 

But MacReady wasn‘t about to fail being a well-connected team leader because of his personal issues with augs. He was brought back to the present when Jensen inclined his head and spoke up in that haughty deep almost-whisper he called a voice.

 

„Is this about me not coming to the training sessions?“

 

„ _Partially_.. Look I‘m gonna be direct, Jensen; If we don‘t work on getting along outside of field missions, Miller is likely gonna set us up for an intervention with Auzenne. And I don‘t know about you, but that woman makes me feel uneasy.“

 

That definitely seemed to be something they agreed on at least, since Adam immediately smirked and nodded. He turned around to face his computer and checked his work calendar to be sure he didn‘t have anything coming up this evening before turning back around to look at Mac.

 

„Alright. Where do you want to meet? There aren‘t many places that will allow me in these days. We might have to stick to the Red Light District.“ Even with the Human Restoration Act stopped, people in Prague were still wary of augs and it would likely take months before the situation would shift.

 

Thinking for a moment, Duncan shrugged lightly and fiddled around with the notepad he had brought along without even noticing. One of these days that thing was going to attach itself to his arm with how much he used it. „Might as well hit up the Red Queen. That way we can look at some tits to distract ourselves if we piss each other off too much.“ As an afterthought he added, „Well, alternatively some pecs. Heard they cater to almost any interest.“

 

Being the observant bastard that he was, Jensen immediately noticed that MacReady hadn‘t excluded himself from staring at some nice pecs and raised an eyebrow. „Works for me. We might even get a discount on the drinks. I did the owner a favor..“

 

Mac was pretty sure there was an interesting story behind that comment, but he restrained himself from asking about it and instead took a look at his watch. „Meet ya at the bar at 8 o‘clock?“

 

„I‘ll be there.“


	2. Misperception

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This took me way too long, sorry about that.
> 
> Hope you guys like the new chapter :)

For now, it was time to get back to work. Glancing at the unfinished documents on his computer screen made Duncan want to cry a little. If he had known how much writing he‘d need to do as a team leader, he‘d never have accepted the new position and tried to get back into the regular army. But what was done, was done and bitching about it in inner monologues didn‘t make those requisition forms, reports and various other crap fill themselves out faster.

 

At least concentrating on his work made the time go by faster. After their mission in London, things had been eerily quiet. People seemed to be in a state of confusion. If he was honest, MacReady was just as confused. Sure, he had been briefed on what Jensen had uncovered but parts of it made no sense..

 

There was bound to be a bigger picture to it all. He only realized that he had been staring at his screen, frozen in the middle of a typing motion with his pen in his mouth when Aria spoke up from her current spot at the doorframe of his office. „Uhm.. Are you okay, sir? I brought you some coffee.“

 

Rubbing his face for a moment, Mac motioned for her to come in. Augs still made him nervous, but no matter how hard he tried it was fucking impossible not to like Aria at least a bit. She was a sweet young lady and in fact reminded him of his first wife. Before that marriage had gone to shit, at least.

 

„Thanks. Are the boys behaving themselves? I know how guys can get when they are workin‘ on too much testosterone.“ There were two new recruits, both young men fresh out of their first military service and they were every bit as fuelled by their sex drive and macho world view as Duncan had been at that age.

 

Gods, he was really getting old, was he?

 

„Oh, they joke around and make some remarks, but I can handle that. Besides, it‘s not like I‘m the only girl in the unit. I guess that makes it easier.“ Aria paused for a moment before continuing, her tone a bit more artificially inconspicuous than before. „So, I heard you are taking Adam for a drink later?“

 

Mac was about to huff up in annoyance and ask her how the hell she‘d heard of that, but reminded himself that he was in a secret base full of special agents.. Pretty much impossible to hide anything unless you try really, really hard. „Yeah. What about it? If you‘re worried I‘m trying to put moves on him, relax. Just trying to get over some issues.“

 

Miss Argento smiled and seemed to be holding back a chuckle. „Not worried at all, sir. I was just wondering if maybe you‘d like some friendly advice?“

 

Advice? Well, Aria knew Adam better than anyone else in the building. Chang also seemed to be sort of chummy with Jensen, but not on the same level. „Alright, let‘s hear it.“ Leaning back in his desk chair, he gave her an expectant look and motioned for her to talk.

 

„Don‘t talk about relationships the first couple of times you go out with him and wear that nice shirt you wore for last year‘s Christmas party. See you later, I need to check something.“ Aria winked and made her way out of the office, leaving a dumbstruck MacReady behind to slowly realize that she was insinuating a date.

 

„W- ... HEY!“

 

\------

 

Adam who had just finished his own stack of paperwork, allowed himself to relax a bit and went to fetch some milk from the fridge in the staff kitchen. Making a note to stock up on milk later, he returned to his desk and enjoyed some of his favorite cereal while watching some videos on the web. Mainly puppies and dogs being happy and playing.

 

It was bittersweet. While those videos made him miss Kubrick even more, they also were one of the few things that still managed to make him smile. Animals, dogs especially, always had a spot in Adam‘s heart no matter how many times people hurt him.

 

He had been engrossed in a mother dog grooming her squeaking puppies when he noticed Aria had stepped up to his desk and was watching along silently.

 

„Hey Aria.“

 

„Hey, Adam. Those are some adorable puppies.. Are those tiny poodles?“ The two new recruits had their desks nearby and she could hear them snicker and probably say something rude. They were typical macho youngsters who were confused by men like Adam who were confident enough in their masculinity to not give a damn who knew that he liked adorable baby animals.

 

„Yeah. Just without the silly haircuts they tend to be given. I like them better like this. How come you‘re still here? Shouldn‘t you be on your way home by now?“ It was almost seven pm and her shift usually ended by six.

 

„Oh, I had a little chat with our team leader and thought I‘d check in on you before I go.“ Aria usually made sure to check that Adam didn‘t work overtime too much and often ended up nudging him to get some rest already.

 

MacReady being mentioned sent Adam into a thoughtful mood and he moved his fingers over his chin as if to scratch it. But smooth alloy really sucked at getting rid of your itches or helping you think. „Hmm.“

 

„Just between us.. Try to steer him away from hard drinks after a few. Might be surprising but despite being British I heard that our brave leader is a lightweight.“

 

Adam raised his eyebrows at that. It was indeed unexpected. Sure, everybody went on about not judging people by their appearance and all that but a guy like MacReady pretty much screamed ‚I drink hard liquor‘. Then again, it would also explain why Adam had only found open wine bottlesand the whiskey was always untouched while rummaging through Mac‘s office a little.

 

„I‘ll see what I can do. Could you get these forms over to Chang on your way out?“  
  
Aria smirked and took the stack into her hands. „Only if you tell me in detail how it went, tomorrow.“

 

Sighing a little, he lifted one hand for a pinky swear. „Fine.“ Normally he‘d be reluctant to share such details, depending on how the night went, but Jensen trusted her enough to know that she would not spread anything he told her unless he added that it was okay to do so.

 

„See you tomorrow, Adam.“

 

\----

 

Once he had wrapped up everything at work for the day, Adam made his way home to shower and freshen up a little. This might not be a date, despite what Aria seemed to think, but it was impossible for him to feel relaxed when he was dirty.

 

Even without any trips into the city‘s sewer system Adam had gotten a lot of dust and particles from various construction sites on him. A lot of damaged buildings were either being renovated or rebuilt if they weren‘t historically listed.

 

After his shower and a small instant meal to stave off the worst of the hunger he felt, Jensen checked the clock widget on his HUD and noted that he should be getting ready to go soon to make his way over to the Red Queen.

 

None of his clothes were particularly flashy but he picked his nicest shirt, some well-fitting pants and the coat with the golden, floral details. It didn‘t matter how conservative he dressed, as soon as Adam stepped into the red light district of Prague, he would have to expect verbal harassment, job offers and the occasional drunk person thinking he was one of the aug prostitutes. The fact that he was wearing a long, thick coat didn‘t put anyone off.

 

They acted as if he was waltzing down the streets naked simply because he was augmented. Sighing a little when a young woman gave him a loud wolf-whistle, the agent made his way over to the bar of the establishment, cherishing the much less offensive greeting by the lady working the bar.

 

„Ah, Mr. Tall, dark and handsome has returned~ I just got a new load of fine whiskey. Mrs. Kadlek said that you and anyone you bring drink on the house.“

 

„Thanks.. Say, you didn‘t happen to see a guy with a large scar on the right side on his face? A bit shorter than me and-“ Adam was about to continue giving her a detailed description when she waved him off and smirked.

 

„Sorry, haven‘t seen your date, big boy. I only started my shift a few minutes ago and it has been pretty quiet.“

 

For a moment he considering arguing that MacReady wasn‘t his date, but that would be futile considering they were meeting in an establishment clearly meant for adults wanting to have a good time.

 

\----

 

Just then, Mac walked through the door and spotted Adam at the bar, chatting with the lady serving the drinks. It seemed like the aug had picked his most fancy coat too. Had Jensen misunderstood his intention and expected a date?

 

For a moment the thought sent Mac into a small panic, because he was NOT ready for any sort of dating. While he had actually put on his nice shirt like Aria had told him to, Duncan had been too tuckered out by all that paperwork to put any effort into shaving, leaving him looking a lot more scruffy than he was comfortable with.. Not that he wanted to date Jensen of all people. Where had that thought even come from in the first place?

 

Giving himself a mental kick, he walked over and sat down at the bar next to Adam. „Evenin‘. Lookin‘ shiny and ready for action like usual, Jensen.“ His brain to mouth filter promptly shut itself off, like it usually did when he was near the other agent and making Mac wince internally. Jesus. Good start.

 

Lucky for him Adam didn‘t seem to mind his little quip. „You look like you could use a drink. I polished the goods just for you, MacReady.“ He wanted to sink down into the ground when he noticed that he‘d just made a blatant sexual innuendo. Usually the ex-cop didn‘t mind blurting out some witty one-liners but doing it in this ambience while on a mission to bond with his team leader made it feel more poignant than it should have been.

 

After getting that gem of a reply, Duncan decided that YES, he did need a drink or five to get through this and ordered some scotch. Thankfully the rest of their conversation went more smoothly. They started off sharing some past work experiences, Adam telling Duncan about being a cop in Detroit, about the SWAT disaster and Mac sharing some of the horrors of the desert anti-terror ops he‘d been on so long.

 

As the evening stretched on, MacReady was getting more and more tipsy and started to have problems keeping himself on his spot at the bar. Adam‘s tries to lure him away from strong drinks had been in vain. His own system didn‘t allow him to get totally drunk anymore. A pleasant buzz, nothing else.

 

„I think we should call it a day. Where do you live?“

 

„Hrm. District 9. Forgot the Czech name again.“

 

Adam rubbed his face a bit. District 9 was pretty far from here. Making a decision he helped the intoxicated agent up on his feet and started leading him outside.

 

„Where are we goin‘?“ While drunk his British accent was much more evident and he seemed to be lacking his usual sense of orientation.  
  
„To my place. You are in no state to travel alone or give me precise directions.“

 

Thankfully Mac was a lot more docile than usual when drunk and let himself be moved without much resistance.

 

\----

 

They made it to Adam‘s apartment in one piece, even if they got more than a few looks from people on their way.

 

His plan had been to stash Duncan on the couch and let him sleep off his current state. But apparently Mac had other ideas and shed his jacket, shirt and pants and snuggled himself into Adam‘s bed, apparently convinced that he was at home. A lot of today's apartments were set up in a similar way so it was not a real surprise that a drunk guy would be fooled easily, but still.  


God damn it.

No way he was curling in on the couch himself. His nightmares pretty much guaranteed that he‘d wake up with a sore neck, on the floor. That alone would be endurable, but after taking down Marchenko and getting hit with more than one emp blast in the process, Adam had been having some issues with his shoulder and back muscles that he still needed to see Koller about.  
  
Resigning himself to his fate, Adam took off his clothes, keeping his underwear on unlike usually, and laid down to rest next to the other man in his bed.

His heart almost stopped when he felt two hairy, muscular arms draw him in close along with some rough stubble scratching over his shoulder. Mac was a cuddler, apparently. But as much as Adam wanted to hate this, it felt amazingly good to have another human being next to him while he rested. Something he hadn't experienced in years.

Listening to Duncan‘s heartbeat, feeling his breath ghost over his skin and the warmth of his body..

For once, he didn‘t go through a whole night of nightmares. They didn‘t entirely disappear, but Jensen still slept a lot better than usually.


	3. Misery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not a lot of dialogue in this chapter, but quite a few realizations :)
> 
> Also Adam being cheeky in the end :D

The first thing Mac noticed when he woke up at 4am as usual, was that apparently he must have gotten lucky. Having been single for several years now, it was a bit odd to wake up with somebody in his bed. No matter what he had tried, the former soldier always woke up at 4am ever since his long-time desert employment. It had been the time where he had gotten up to scout the outer perimeter of the camp to check for sandstorms or other dangers. Likely he would have to live with this quirk for the rest of his life, among others.

 

Most of the time, Duncan was a one night only kinda guy and didn‘t really like it when his conquests stayed over, considering that he often went to work quite early. Having a stranger in his apartment when he wasn‘t around to keep an eye on them? Nope.

 

The second thing he noticed, was that the arm thrown over his side was augmented. For a moment he panicked and wondered if he had put moves on Aria, a sweet girl like that didn‘t deserve to be picked up by a humongous jerk like he was. Not to mention that she was a bit too young to be partying with him.

 

The augmented arm he felt though.. It was a well-made one, but he still noticed that it was heavier than it should be for it‘s frame and also didn‘t stir at all. Most people moved at least a little bit when they slept. But aug limbs didn‘t react to such small impulses, apparently. There were no sharp edges or uncomfortable parts pressing against him so it must be something specially made, no black market produce.

 

Blinking a few times he tried to remember what happened during the evening before, but his brain was still working on dealing with the unfamiliar situation.

 

Letting out a yawn, he noted that whoever he ended up with sure was tall.. A model? Wait, that was definitely a beard tickling his chest. Could still be a model going by the well-groomed smooth skin he felt rubbing against his own but-

 

That was the exact moment MacReady recognized the person laying halfway across him. _Agent Jensen_. How the heck had he ended up with Jensen in his bed?!

 

 **Shit**. This wasn‘t even his bed! Now that his eyes had gotten used to the darkness he noted that opposite to the bed, there was a desk cluttered with small mechanical parts of some sort. Did Jensen repair his own augs? No, that wouldn‘t be possible with how heavily he was modified.

 

Rubbing his face with his right hand, the one that was able to move at the moment without waking the other man, Duncan decided that he could deal with this later when his head didn‘t hurt as much and when he had some more sleep.

 

Closing his eyes with a sigh, he drifted back to sleep.

 

\----

 

The next one to wake up was Adam, at a more normal time. It was 7am and he froze in spot when he felt another person next to him. Then he remembered what had happened and relaxed. MacReady might be an asshole sometimes, but he definitely wasn‘t an illuminati agent.

 

Jensen had no proof against him and his gut feeling told him that Mac was too much of a honest, no-bullshit person to play along with secretive bullshit. Carefully he leaned up to rest on one elbow and couldn‘t help but smile.

 

MacReady actually looked somewhat relaxed and peaceful when he slept, snoring lightly and occasionally shifting a bit to get comfortable.

 

Lifting one hand, Adam found himself compelled to attempt feeling some of that fluffy chest hair his team leader sported. The ex-cop had always been rather smooth himself, even before the dermal armor procedures had destroyed the rest of his body hair. These days the only spots on his body where he still had any of it left where his head, of course, and his groin.

 

Sadly even with his special prototype augs, it was nowhere near as fun to run his hands across fuzzy hair. It registered as a weird tingly sensation but there was no tickle, no feeling of small curls across his fingertips as he moved them over the other man's chest..

 

Reigning himself back in, Adam retreated his hand. MacReady likely wouldn‘t appreciate being fondled like this. Well at least not while he was awake. In his sleeping state he definitely seemed to react positively, going by the tent that was starting to appear in the blanket over his crotch. Feeling his face flush, the younger of the two men was at a loss how to react to this. Should he wake Mac? Or let him have his wet dream?

 

In the end he decided that Duncan would likely be grumpy waking up with a hangover and a boner to boot, especially being faced with an undressed aug as his first view of the day.

 

Shaking his head to disperse those thoughts, he slowly got up from his bed and went to take a quick shower. Seeing how the other man was likely to be feeling like crap after having downed so much alcohol the day before, he planned making some nice breakfast. Usually Adam did not bother with cooking when he was by himself.

 

But if he had a guest, he might as well put a healthy meal in them. Especially since a good meal tended to help a hangover, he knew from plenty of past experiences.

 

Once he was done with his shower and had put on his clothes as quietly as possible, Adam wrote a note for Mac before making a quick trip to the local store.

 

‚Out to get food.  
I‘ll let Miller know we‘ll be late today.  
Dissolved some aspirin for you.  
If you can‘t take it for some reason there are other meds in the bathroom.  
~ Adam‘

 

\----

 

When he returned from his small grocery trip, Jensen noted that the glass with the aspirin and water was empty and there was still light snoring coming from the bedroom. This suited him just fine, he could make breakfast for them and they could have an awkward conversation about ending in bed together once they both had something in their stomachs. People liked to joke that Adam mostly lived off cereal, and admittedly he did eat a lot of it, but he also made sure to eat healthy food. Mostly instant meals as they were nothing like they had been in in his youth.

 

Instant meals today were pretty much the healthiest thing available because they had all the vitamins, minerals and other things your body needed with way less salt, fat and other less healthy ingredients commonly used in cooking. But since he wasn‘t sure how Mac felt about instant meals, Adam had actually bought some fresh veggies, eggs and meat. These days almost everything was either genetically manipulated food or grown in large hydroponic facilities.

 

Some people claimed they could taste the difference but Jensen was pretty sure they were talking bullshit. While he was frying the bacon, he heard some loud yawns and grumbling from the bedroom. Seemed like he was going to have to deal with the other agent in his home soon.

 

\----

 

The scent of fried bacon woke him from his slumber and god did it smell good. Mac could feel himself salivate as he stirred and sat up on the bed, rubbing his temples a bit. Glancing down, he mentally scolded his dick for being bothersome right now and thought about some seriously nasty things to make Sergeant Mac, Jr. consider going back to sleep. He was not about to rub one out when Jensen could be just around the corner.

His head felt a little better after the aspirin and he slowly managed to put his clothes on without falling over or getting nauseous. It was a fact that he had shared a bed with Jensen last night, but that didn‘t mean he was going to parade around in his briefs without feeling self-conscious around the other man from now on.

Following his nose, he walked over to the kitchen and couldn‘t help an amused smirk at the picture unfolding in front of him. Agent Jensen wearing a baby blue apron was making breakfast and humming a little tune while scrambling some eggs.

„Did I get the Las Vegas treatment? Don‘t remember marrying you, Jensen.“ Not than any of his wives had ever made him breakfast like this, but he wasn‘t about to admit that.

„Good morning, MacReady. I figured I should help you with the hangover since I don‘t get to have any myself anymore.. Robo-liver and all that.“ The Sentinel Health System filtered out pretty much anything that could damage his system. If he drank fast enough, Adam could overload it to get a bit buzzed, but otherwise no chance to get drunk like a skunk.

 

„Hrm. Gotta admit, that is an aug I might have considered if I ever wanted to have any metal parts in me besides that rod in my leg.“ Sitting down on the couch, he sighed a little and glanced over to Jensen a few times, a question hanging in the air between them. Thanks to his CASIE mod Adam picked up on the tension when a little message popped up in his field of view and smirked. „We did not have sex if you are worried about that. You pretty much collapsed into bed once I brought you here and I didn‘t feel like couch-surfing so I joined in.“

 Duncan should feel relieved, but instead he felt just a tiny bit disappointed. He tended to be his most charming when drunk. Was he loosing his touch? Not that he wanted to get Jensen into bed of course, but it did give him pins and needles in his ego. „How are you such a damn boyscout? You could at least have drawn a dick on my face with some sharpie. Don‘t you Americans have any fun? Or is it just you?“

The aug looked amused and raised an eyebrow. „You really don‘t need a dick on your forehead for people to know that you are one, Mac.“ While talking he was putting the food on two plates with a mischievous glint in his modded eyes, invisible behind the dark shades.  
  
„.. Fair point.“ Eliza Cassan was droning on the news like usual when he turned on the tv and he scoffed when some of the rich folks that had been at the event in London talked like they had done it all. Rich bastards hadn‘t done a thing besides shit their pants.

Jensen brought his plate over and Mac almost let it fall when he saw what shape he had arranged the bacon and eggs in. A big cock with some scrambled egg jizz and red bell pepper pubes.

 

„ _Fucking hell, Jensen!_ “

 

„Eat a dick, Mac. I‘m sure it tastes really good.“

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters in one day :D *being productive*


	4. Mislead

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gosh darn it those two give me fuzzy feelings c:  
> I think it is a good sign when I made myself laugh while writing this chapter, seeing as how this is meant to be fun :D
> 
> NOTE: From November 17th on I will be on a small mini-hiatus for a hospital stay. Probably around a week or so. I will be back, no worries~

They finished their breakfast in amiable silence, both of them half-listening to the news. Both of them had expected this to be a lot more awkward, but Adam didn‘t like making a fuss out of things that weren‘t worth making a fuss over and Mac found that having somebody take care of him after a drinking binge really improved his mood and willingness to compromise.

„So, what did you tell Miller in terms of when to expect us at work? I don‘t think I‘ll be very useful today..“ His headache wasn‘t as head-splitting as it usually was thanks to the painkillers and the hearty breakfast seemed to have helped refueling his body, but he still felt a bit dizzy and generally unwell. If Jim needed him he‘d work through it of course, but having a day off to recover would be nice.

Adam had just finished his last piece of bacon and enjoyed the taste for a moment before answering. „Told him to expect me at 11 at the latest and that I would tell him until 8 if you don‘t feel well enough to come in. He said it‘s no problem.“

Sure it wasn‘t. They were both hard-working agents and Jim knew that once in a while Mac needed to go out and do something dumb like getting drunk to feel human again. Besides, it had been pretty quiet the last couple of days.

„Fair enough. Gives us some more time to take a breather before making decisions.“ Duncan got up from the couch to collect both their plates and cutlery to put them in the sink before returning to his comfy spot in front of the TV.

When Jensen moved in to sit next to him, he started noticing that the aug was slooowly inching closer. When Jensen still hadn‘t spoken up after the third movement Mac rolled his eyes a little. Sometimes he wondered how this guy managed to scare most of TF29 when in truth he was total dork. „Something I can help you with, agent?“  
  
Adam froze and seemed to be thinking for a moment before speaking up. „This night out might not have turned out as expected, but I did enjoy sharing the bed with you.“ After having been pretty much completely starved for any sort of gentle touch or close human contact for years, Jensen wasn‘t above admitting this much. His isolation was largely self-imposed but that didn‘t mean it was comfortable for him. Introverted or not, Adam did need some positive human interaction once in a while. Just not as often as most people.

They shared a long intense look and Mac almost felt the cogwheels turn in his own head. „Well, you aren‘t nearly as uppity as I thought. Didn‘t leave me behind or make a scene.. Not to mention you happen to look great in an apron, unlike my last wife.“ Furthermore judging by the small chuckle that comment got him, Jensen seemed to have an appreciation for his dry, sometimes quite dark, sense of humor. That was definitely earning him some bonus points on Duncan‘s pro-and-cons list of getting chummy with an aug.

„The way I see it, we can be grown-ups about this and come to an arrangement.. Maybe go out a couple more times to see how it works out and where this takes us.“ Duncan wasn‘t the kind of guy to stubbornly insist on keeping the same views. So far Adam had not disappointed him or given him any other sort of reason to keep being wary, in fact Jensen had shown himself to be both a very capable agent and easy to get along with if you respected his reclusive lifestyle.

It would still take a while for Duncan to get over his personal issues with augs, but that was something he could work on. Problems didn‘t solve themselves, usually. It had been a harrowing experience to see two well-trained agents get basically ripped to pieces by an augmented civilian... But at the same time, he had seen child soldiers killing people in the Middle East without worrying about all children he met. It was well worth a try.

„An arrangement? That depends on what you have in mind, Mac.“ Adam‘s interest was certainly peaked and he waited for his colleague to elaborate.

„We had a good time sharing a bed. In fact I wouldn‘t mind doing this again. But I also think we ought to test out what we‘re gonna be comfortable with aside from that. Right now I don‘t know what it's gonna be or how far we can go before I start having some problems.“ Sighing a little, he almost startled when the smart home system opened a small crack in the blinds for a more natural ambiance in the room. „It‘s not because you‘re a bloke, I fooled around with some of my fellow soldiers in the army a couple of times.. I just haven‘t done anything intimate with an aug before and we also work together in a non-combat environment, outside of missions. I might need a bit of time to get used to this.“

Jensen gave him a nod and actually drew back his shades. He didn‘t blame the other man for needing a bit of time to get used to him. Hell, Adam had taken years to get remotely used to his own augs and he still had some issues with touching himself or looking into a mirror for longer than a minute.

Mac hadn‘t seen the other man‘s eyes before and it was a bit of a shock. A positive one, but still. The very faint glow of the artificial irises and the movements of the different ring elements they consisted of was a bit unsettling, yet in a strange way beautiful. It also told him why Adam kept his shades out pretty much all the time, despite his eyes being artificial they still managed to convey vulnerability and emotions in combination with the rest of his face. The expressions weren‘t artificial just because part a of his face was.

„Makes sense. So for now we‘ll just see what happens, then.“ Making a bold decision, Adam gently rested his head on MacReady‘s shoulder and shifted a bit to get comfortable.

Raising an eyebrow Duncan gave him a slightly confused look and seemed to be undecided on whether to flinch back or not. Going from bitching at each other over the infolink to cuddling on the couch was quite the jump. „What are you doing?“  
  
„Testing out comfort zones.“ So far this was nice. Watching TV like this was something either of them could get used to, even if neither would admit it out loud yet. But even small steps still were a movement in the right direction.  
  
„Alright then.. I kinda expected your noggin‘ to be heavier with all the tech you got crammed in there.“

„God damn it, Mac. Way to ruin the mood.“

\----

At 8am, Duncan called Miller himself to tell the director that he needed a day off. Of course his old friend was curious how their night out had gone.

„We had a good talk, I got drunk off my ass and Jensen lugged me into his place like a good boyscout.“ Mac was reluctant to share that they had slept in the same bed since he knew that despite appearing like the professional, paternal type Jim was still a gay man and divorced. Giving him uncomfortable boners or possibly evoking memories of his marriage seemed like a dick move on his part. Naturally things didn‘t go like he planned.

„It‘s not my place to pry, Mac. But Jensen mentioned you were still in bed.. It sounded like you were both in there before from how he worded things. Is there something you might want to tell me?“

Getting a bit irritated MacReady went into full sarcasm mode without being able to do anything about it. Maybe he should message Sarif about working on a brain-to-mouth filter augment for him. That would really be something he‘d throw his principles against augmentation in the bin for.

„Oh, right! I forgot to mention the hardcore anal sex we had. If Jensen didn‘t have those aug legs, he‘d be limping around like a beat dog, Jim. Almost bruised my nuts on that shiny metal ass of his while bending him over the bed like a whore.“

It sounded like Miller had choked on his coffee and was trying to regain his composure between loud coughs and clearing his throat. „Fuckin‘ hell, Mac! Don‘t spring this kind of mental image on me.. Almost had a heart attack. I get it, you don‘t want to talk about this. But I‘m gonna trust you to tell me if things go down the drain, okay?“

„You‘ll be the first person to know if robocop and me need some marriage counselling. Right now we‘re doing just fine. Also, don‘t think I forgot about the 500 credits you owe me, Jim. See ya tomorrow.“

\----

Adam hadn‘t been able to help listening in on that  phone call and tried his best to keep his chuckles inaudible while looking over the local Detroit news on his digital newspaper. It was becoming more and more unlikely that he would be returning to his home city anytime soon, but he still kept an eye on things. Not just because Pritchard was still there, but also because of his adoptive parents.

It had been shocking to find out that they weren‘t his biological parents, but that didn‘t mean Adam loved them any less. Besides, how do you tell your son that he was a test baby in a shady facility? No, he couldn‘t really blame them.

Glancing aside, he noted that MacReady was watching intently. „.. Is there something on my face?“

Mac smirked a little. „Aside from the beard and the fancy shades? Nah, I‘m just trying to figure out how your hands work. I mean, I know how a human hand works but I have no idea how the hell one would replicate something that natural and-“ Adam interrupted him by offering him one of his hands, holding it in front of him in a neutral position.

„I don‘t mind if you want to take a closer look or touch my hand. I‘d open it up for you but that is not an option unless I have my aug specialist nearby to put it back together.“ For a few moments that seemed like a small eternity, Duncan didn‘t move and just stared at the appendage like it was a gun pointed at him. The older man had been deadly honest when he‘d said he‘d need some time to work on his issues. Taking some deep breaths helped him through the feeling of his stomach clenching up in anxiety.

Carefully he traced the ridges on the artificial wrist with one fingertip before hesitantly gripping the hand as if giving it a shake to see how it felt against his own. It was remarkably well-made but there were still some details that were off. Mainly the texture and weight. The movements of the fingers and wrist were pretty much perfect. „Does it ever hurt? Phantom pain or at the end where it .. connects?“

The fact that Mac was curious, even if slightly worried as well instead of disgusted was a relief to Adam and he tried his best to answer as accurately as possible. „Only the first few months. Eventually the connections to the rest of my body were good enough for the augs to be recognized as new limbs by my brain. So far I haven‘t had any problems with friction or irritated skin except for- ..“

Jensen stopped himself and blushed a bit. His leg augs had dermal anchors that covered most of his hips and backside. In the beginning he had been rather sore because the anchors on his ass pretty much covered everything up to his crack. It had taken a while until the skin and muscles there had properly adapted to the change. „Sitting down was painful for a while.“

That seemed to confuse and startle his team leader a bit since the vague answer left room for interpretation. „But they didn‘t- You‘re still intact, are you?“

It took Adam a bit to get what MacReady was hinting at. „Yes, still have those parts.. I meant this.“ To emphasize his point, he took one of Mac‘s hands and shifted so he could place it on his backside. Immediately an expression of both understanding and surprise came over the older man‘s face.

„... You actually have a metal ass?! I was just joking around on the phone! Bloody hell. Just don‘t tell me you have a built-in juicer back there as well or I might have to rethink how far we‘re taking this.“

Even if the comment made him laugh, Adam rubbed his face a bit. This would be a piece of work if they actually wanted this to go further than some chest hair fondling in the morning at some point. „How about this; once you are not hungover any more we take a few hours to just explore with no added pressure. It‘s far easier to show you what you‘re going to be dealing with rather than describe it all.“

„Sounds like a solid strategy. But it‘s only fair if you get to explore in return. I‘m far less interesting to look at but it won‘t hurt to know what you‘re getting yourself tangled with. _Or rolled under_.“

Another chuckle from Jensen. It was good to see they could still bicker around since he enjoyed their verbal sparring quite a bit. „Being presumptuous, Mac. Why do you think I‘ll let you top?“ Not that he minded it. In fact he hoped that Duncan was willing to switch after a while if he turned out to be as much of commanding presence in the bedroom as he was in the field, but it wouldn‘t be a catastrophe if he didn‘t.

Looking rather smug, the experienced soldier gave him a grin and wiggled his eyebrows a little. „Because tactical _assault_ and _penetrating defences_ is my specialty, agent.“


	5. Mister Darcy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I am a horrible tease. Also apologies for taking longer than expected, surgery was a bit more stressful for my body than anticipated.
> 
> Poor Mac. He does not get any breaks :D Not a 100% happy with this chapter but I need to get back into the groove of writing.

As much fun as it was to hang out, Adam had promised Miller to show up at 2pm. Which meant that after watching TV together for a while and some more cuddling he had to get ready for work. Reluctantly getting up from the couch, Jensen stretched his arms out and even though his shoulder joints didn‘t pop any longer the motion was too ingrained into his habits to be lost to him just yet.

Mac had started to snooze a bit when they had switched channels to some documentary about naked mole rats. As fascinating as those critters were with their inability to feel pain on their skin and almost bee-like social structure, they looked like shrivelled dicks with teeth and Mac had quickly decided to go to his happy place to drown the sight of them out. Nature was just plain weird sometimes. „Gotta get going already, hm? Listen, I know there is no keeping things secret longer than a few days in TF29 but how do you wanna handle this? I figured as long as we don‘t know the details ourselves, we keep this on the low.“

While slipping into his usual work getup in the bedroom, Adam nodded to himself before realizing that Mac couldn‘t see that from the couch. „That might be best. I did promise Aria to report on how this went, though.“

At the mention of Aria, Mac raised his eyebrows. She had been the one to be strangely interested in their little manly bonding time and advised him to wear his nice shirt. His conspiracy senses were tingling.. Not that Duncan really minded. If the young lady wanted to play matchmaker, she could try. After three marriages gone to shit, maybe it was time to let somebody else handle the pick on his next possible relationship. God knows he tended to be a lot less irritated with the world when he got laid once in a while.

But for anything like that to happen he still had to get over the fact that Adam had a whole bunch of metal and high-tech plastics attached to him. And inside of him. And on him. Jesus.

„As long as you don‘t tell her I spooned you, I‘m okay with that. We don‘t want to send her into celebration mode too early. Maybe your wiring was just messed up and you‘ll suddenly realize the huge mistake you made.“

The breathy chuckle he heard from the other part of the apartment seemed to indicate the opposite though. „You might have a harsh mouth on you MacReady, but I‘d be surprised if you betrayed me and used my DNA for experiments like my ex-girlfriend. Doesn‘t seem like something I‘d catch you doing.“  
  
Now that certainly made the older agent listen up. „.. She stole your DNA for experiments?! Christ. To think I used to complain about my second wife snagging my favourite signed Rod Stewart album when she moved out. Seems like I was being a whiny snot in comparison.“

„Not sure about that. Rod Stewart is some _damn_ good shit and I still have a lot of DNA on me to spare.“

„Shut your face, you‘re starting to make me like you more than I‘m comfortable with yet.“

Another chuckle followed.

\----

Duncan had started to make his way to his own home shortly after Adam had left for work, not wanting to overexert his hospitality. Besides, he needed a change of clothes, a shower and to shave properly. His bromance with Jensen definitely wasn‘t far along enough to share shaving supplies yet.

Adam on the other hand had just arrived at the TF29 HQ and pretty much acted like nothing had happened. He gave Aria a friendly nod on his way past her to the stairs and noted that some people were giving him looks. A quick look at the nearest reflecting surface told him that there was nothing on his face that shouldn‘t be there, so he ignored them.

„Hey Jensen! Where did you stash our boss?! If you killed him you better fess up now.“ It was one of the two new guys who addressed him. Not in the mood to appease to the rude young man, Adam smirked and turned around slowly.

„I could show you... But then I‘d have to kill you too.“ The reaction showed him that those two were all bark and no bite since they actually turned a few shades whiter than they were before. „He‘s at home, hungover. Taking a day off, I believe.“ They seemed relieved but still apprehensive.

At least they stopped bothering him for now. While Adam could not get truly drunk any more unless he downed lethal amounts of alcohol, it still left him feeling a bit off. Like he should be aching. Maybe his brain had something similar to muscle memory, replaying echoes of his real liver? Who knew.

Sitting down at his desk the agent was rather confused to find a new mail from MacReady sitting in his inbox. Opening it, Jensen found a rather suggestive picture of his team leader that stopped short just above his pubic area. It looked like one of those classical bathroom selfies. It would make for a nice profile picture on grindr. Then again Adam was not sure that grindr still existed. He‘d never been into chat dating and hookups much and sure wasn‘t going to start now.

The time stamp told him that Mac must have sent this while still drunk, from the bathroom at the Red Queen, judging by the flashy red neon lights. Next time he was going to confiscate the guy‘s phone when they went out drinking, damn it. Hoping that Chang hadn‘t seen this yet, he quickly copied it over to his personal Pocket Secretary and deleted it as completely as possible from his work station, using a few of the tricks he had seen Francis use on sensitive data before.

The rest of the day was rather uneventful, but his mind kept drifting back to that picture.

\----

 

The next morning, Mac was the first to enter the office, not even Jensen was there yet, and checked up on the things he had missed out on yesterday. Not much, it seemed. But that only made it more comfortable for him to ease back into the usual pace at work. It would be nice to have a proper field mission again, but apparently the terrorists had gone into hibernation.

When Jim walked in he was hoping for a sudden emergency deployment, but nope. Instead he got a Christmas present he hadn‘t asked for, nor wanted. Santa Miller was bringing some coals for naughty, naughty Duncan.

„You better be shitting me, Jim.“  
  
Instead of starting to brief him on the situation carefully, apparently Miller had decided to break the news to him by simply handing him a new sign for his office door. Probably the better course of action for this, to be honest. Long explanations tended to only irritate Duncan even more in the long run.  
  
‚ _Duncan MacReady, Counter-Terrorism and Organized Crime_ ‘

„I‘m afraid this is not a joke.. The bosses don‘t have a replacement for Vincent Black in sight and I can‘t just put a rookie on top of one of the most dangerous departments, Mac! This is only temporary, you have my word on that. Besides, I think Jensen has earned a small promotion. You could have him handle some of the load.. The guy worked as a cop in Detroit and has shown some serious skills in undermining the Dvali while working on his other investigations. He knows how to handle gangs.“

Mac was not happy about this. Not that he didn‘t very much agree with Jensen having done good work and possessing the needed skills, but this would also put Adam in considerable danger. Diddling with the Mafia was never a good idea and Vincent Black had already paid the price for it. The thought of sending the aug to mess around with that fucked up gang was giving him a migraine.

„As soon as we get a replacement this arrangement is off. I don‘t want any large-scale ops happening while we are working in this constellation and you better explain to the higher-ups that I won‘t throw my agents in the line of fire just because they don‘t have their shit together.“

„I‘ll probably word it differently but I‘ll relay the message. Chin up, Mac. You‘ll manage this somehow.“

\----

Double the paperwork, double the agents to watch over, half the time. If he didn‘t already have a bunch of grey hairs he‘d probably be growing his first batch by now. Luckily, due to their long-going friendship Jim had gotten the hint and not approached him more than necessary to avoid riling Mac up even more.

Adam had been quite surprised by the sudden shift at work and was trying his best to take as much work off his boss as possible. Paperwork wasn‘t exactly his favourite thing in the world either, but it didn‘t stress him out as much as it did with Duncan. Aria tried to cheer MacReady up by bringing him some proper British-style tea, but even that didn‘t do much.

Wringing his brain for a plan, Adam decided to hit two birds with one stone and made his way into MacReady‘s office through the vent system, using his glass field cloaking to quickly get under the desk when Mac had gotten up to scribble on his planning board.

Since he was pretty sure that his cold metal hands would startle the other man, Adam gently pressed the side of his face against one of Duncan‘s muscular thighs. That seemed to have the intended effect. A small surprise, but no fear or apprehension.

 _„.. Jensen?“_  
  
Instead of answering verbally, he gently showed one of his hands to Mac, knowing that he would recognize it.

„If you want to re-enact Bill Clinton‘s desk adventures you should let me lock the door fir-“ There was no getting up when those freakishly strong hands pushed his hips down to keep him on his desk chair. Of course, why would it be different, this was the moment Aria walked into the office to check up on him and chat a little. Gritting his teeth, the ex-soldier prepared for the worst.

„I brought you some more tea. Uhm. You look a bit tense, sir. Are you alright?“

The reason for his tension was that there was another agent between his legs, feeling up his thighs and ghosting hot breath over his crotch. ~~No big deal. He didn‘t even notice~~.

**_Actually he noticed immensely._ **

If he got any harder he could probably compete with those alloy-clad arms Adam was moving against his legs right now. To his advantage he wasn‘t the kind of guy who got red-faced when aroused, but it would still be hard to hide this if things got more intense.

„Still feeling the hangover a bit. Nothing seriOUS HNRGH-“ That cheeky clank bastard had somehow managed to silently unzip his pants and was stroking his cock. Duncan was not ready for that, especially while Aria was standing there, looking at him with those innocent doe eyes of hers. It felt like sacrilege.

But at the same time he did not want Jensen to stop on account of being incredibly pent-up and frustrated. Letting his legs fall open further, he leaned back in his chair and rubbed his neck in the hopes to distract from his strange behaviour.

„.. Kink in my back. Never get old, Argento. It‘s not worth it.“ The wince he made when feeling a set of cool fingers groped his nuts coincided with his comment but he did give Adam a small nudge with his knee to try and make him slow down a bit.

„I‘ll try to remember that. Seems you had fun despite the hangover. It‘s good to see you getting along with Adam. He‘s a good friend.“ If Aria knew just how well they were getting along right now, she would probably drop her jaw to the floor. Mac had a hard time believing himself that Jensen was currently hiding under his desk, fondling him like he was a prize stud.

„Fooled him into thinking I‘m not as bad with the glamour of my dress shirt. Good tip there, Aria. But he might regret that later.“

Luckily she laughed and didn‘t seem to suspect anything. Though that wink she shot him before going outside...

„ _Are you nuts?! She could have noticed!_ “ Mac hissed at Adam and rolled his chair back to glare at the other man. Not very effective though with his cock standing at attention from his unzipped pants.

The aug had the audacity to shrug and looked rather pleased with himself too, to top it all off. „I didn‘t see you trying to stop me.“

Sighing loudly, he adjusted his pants so the open zipper stopped pressing against the sensitive skin down there. „Point made. Now get back to work, agent. Don‘t start what you don‘t intend to finish.“

"Sorry, but I have to finish some reports.. Maybe later, boss."

With a flash of energy Jensen had cloaked again and moved out of the room, leaving Duncan behind to bemoan his sad state, stuff his hard cock back into his pants and underwear with some difficulty and get back to writing his report on Dvali trafficking, somehow.  
  
" _ **Asshole**_."

His revenge would be terrible. Just because they got along better now, didn't mean their bickering and petty fighting would stop completely.


	6. The author could not think of a title starting with 'Mis-'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get steamy in this chapter. No revenge for the office shenanigans yet though c: Mac wants it to hit hard and deep. *unintentional pun mode*

Eventually Mac adjusted to the added workload and his sour mood improved considerably when it became apparent that the Dvali were laying low as much as possible after that whole London event. Otar had taken over leadership and he was a lot more careful than Radich.

Jensen‘s little stunt had annoyed him, but as one of TF29‘s top agents he wouldn‘t let that affect his performance. As a trained solider, more so a trained special ops commander, MacReady was pretty damn good at ignoring anything that could distract him from work.  
  
Hunger, thirst? _No biggie_.  
Getting shot in the leg? _Oh, please_.  
Raging erection? .. Might be grumpy but _hey, he had survived much worse_.

That didn‘t mean he‘d let that transgression slide. Jensen had started a little personal war, and war was one of the things he was actually good at. Especially when it came to retaliation strikes and strategic assault.

Which also meant waiting until the time was right for his plan to have the maximum effect though, so he didn‘t let anything on during their second time out for drinks. This time they had moved up to the VIP bar in the Red Queen since the seats there were comfier than the bar stools and the atmosphere a bit quieter. That didn‘t mean people were less rude to Adam though.

They had been in the middle of an interesting conversation about military tech when a guy maybe slightly older than Mac had addressed them after staring Jensen down for several moments. „How much for him?“

Adam, obviously used to this sort of treatment just sighed and studied the drink menu ignoring the offender. Duncan didn‘t immediately get what the guy was playing at. When he did, though he felt his blood-pressure skyrocket into the danger zone. „.. A punch in the visage for you, mate. Piss off or I‘ll show ya what I do to buggers who assume shit without using their brain.“

Taken aback, the patron raised his eyebrows and shrugged. „Take it easy, man. Didn‘t know he was yours.“ That didn‘t help unhinge the situation in the least. Adam was silently recharging his energy levels by plugging a biocell into the hidden port on his left arm in case he needed to keep this from becoming a disaster.

„He ain‘t nobodies property, shitface. Now buzz off. Last warning before I break some bones.“ Thankfully the guy finally got the hint and made some distance from them. Mac might not be the tallest or most buff guy around, but that didn‘t make him any less effective at intimidation. Relieved, Adam deactivated his Reflex Booster and faced Mac with a raised eyebrow. „What got you so worked up? I get this sort of comment every day.“

Duncan made an irritated grunt and downed his shot of Irish whiskey before answering. „That bastard didn‘t even know you a little bit.. When I tease ya, it‘s because we work together and that‘s how I function. Might not seem like it, but I follow an etiquette. I try not to make quips about sexuality, medical issues or family backgrounds. This asshole just straight up assumed you‘re a whore because you got some metal on ya.“ His reasoning likely not made sense to everybody, but it was really common between squad mates in special units to tease each other relentlessly. But there were some rules. A bit like the bro-code, just for military guys (and gals).

„I appreciate the thought but try to keep calm and carry on, Mac. I don‘t want Mrs. Kadlek to get upset because we scared off potential _paying_ costumers.“ Adam smirked and gave his colleague a gentle pat on the shoulder. After a few more drinks they both were feeling pretty relaxed again. This time Adam had made sure they limited the harder stuff to a couple of shots so they ended up still able to make decisions and move around when deciding to call it a night.

Thanks to this strategy, they were both conscious and not overly drunk when they ended up back at Adam‘s apartment tonight.

\----

After shrugging off their outerwear, Duncan remembered what they had been talking about a few days before. „How about we use the time we got to explore a bit?“ Some liquid courage in his veins might actually help him to get past his initial reluctance faster.

Humming in agreement, Adam took off his shirt and boots. Now that he felt more familiar around MacReady there wasn‘t any apprehension about getting comfortable in his own home with him present. „Why not? But we might want to set a safeword in case either of us needs a break or to stop. Better be safe than sorry.“

Thinking for a moment, Mac grinned and crossed his arms. „How about ‚ _teacup_ ‘? Doubt either of us is gonna moan that in the heat of the moment. Unless ya got a secret fetish you forgot to mention.“

Jensen couldn‘t help a chuckle. It sure was more fun than the standard ‚yellow‘ and ‚red‘ system many people used apparently. „That might just be the single most British safeword I ever heard. But alright, works for me.“ Even if they never ended up engaging in any bdsm play, they were both veteran fighters who have been injured before and had their own bad experiences with a variety of situations. And if honest,varying grades of untreated ptsd which made it all the more important to take care.

\----

A few minutes later they were both sitting on Adam‘s bed completely naked, for now just taking the sight of each other in. It was a tiny bit awkward to just stare like this, but there were already a bunch of revelations being made.

For one, Mac was far more scarred than Adam had expected. Aside from the big one in his face that was always visible, there were a bunch of round scars that looked like former gun shot wounds, some large jagged ones across his left side that were probably made by shrapnel and his lower left leg was likely the worst of the bunch. One side sported a large burn scar, the other several remnants of emergency surgery with equipment that probably hadn‘t been high-tech. At a guess he'd say there had been staples in use.

Noting Jensen‘s eyes trailing down to his leg, Duncan sighed a little and rubbed the back of his neck. „Experimental incendiary rounds, Palmyra desert around 2018. Bloody thing almost took my leg off. Our medic had to staple me back together for transport so I wouldn‘t bleed out, before they could fix the bone up properly with a steel rod in Ankara.“

Unable to feel the softness of the scarred skin properly, Adam still wanted to touch it. It was a basic human instinct, wanting to touch something to understand it better. „That must have hurt a lot. How long were you out of commission?“

Snorting a bit, the former soldier watched Adam‘s hand move over his skin almost as if he were a porcelain doll with some amusement. „ _Three weeks_. Switched from infantry to sniping with two spotters until I could hike through the desert at my usual speed again. The reason I was assigned two spotters was that one of the guys had to piggyback me around until I could walk longer distances again.. but that‘s a secret, alright? So _shh._ “

Figuring that it was now his turn, Duncan gently touched the typhoon ports and the small rods visible near the base of Adam‘s shoulders that were part of the extensive system reinforcing his chest. Unlike him, Jensen had few scars and it really showed that he had been given the best medical care available. The skin and metal blended almost perfectly at the edges and only in a few spots raised edges were visible. „They sure replaced a lot.. I‘m guessing not all of that was necessary to save you.“

The report MacReady had read had stated that Adam had been augmented after an assault on Sarif Industries, leading to severe injuries. But there would have been no way, even with advanced tech, that they would have been able to save him if this much had been damaged.

„You‘re right. To survive I would have needed surgery on my brain, left arm and a few organs for the main part. But the employment contract I was under allowed Sarif to basically augment me as much as he wanted to. So he crammed pretty much every piece of prototype tech he had available into me.“ Looking aside for a moment, he let out a heavy breath. „I used to hate him for doing this. But in the end David did give me what I needed for my mission and the missions after that.“

Understanding the sentiment, Mac gently let his hands brush over Adam‘s chest, the skin itself natural but in a few choice places he could feel the slight cushioning of the dermal armor underneath where the thicker mesh-plates protected important organs or arteries.

Having explored Adam‘s arms before on the couch, he let his hands rest on his thighs for a moment. The proportions were pretty much perfect and what he expected on a well-trained but slender guy like Jensen. „Would ya turn around for me?“  
  
The other agent smoothly moved to turn his back to him and he finally got to see what his hands had touched before without any visual barriers. It was a bit odd at first to see a pair of glutes covered by black carbon fiber strands. But in a way, there was something strangely aesthetic about the design. „.. Is it alright if I feel you up a bit? Just throw the safeword at me if I get too handsy for your likin‘.“

„Go ahead.“ It was hard to keep the excitement out of his voice. Adam might generally have a pretty low sex-drive but it had been several years since he had last had any intimacy that didn‘t involve him alone. And the tension between him and Mac was undeniable by now.

The carbon fiber mesh somewhat dampened the feedback he got from being felt up, but as soon as Mac‘s fingers traced his natural skin anywhere it was all the more intense since any remaining nerve endings had over-developed to make up for the lack of sensation elsewhere, making Adam‘s breath hitch with each touch and it took increasing effort to stand still.

Duncan on the other hand was pretty fascinated with how sensitive the other man was. Just trailing a fingertip down his back was enough to make Jensen moan. Mac would be one gigantic liar if he denied finding that intensely erotic. It also made him realize that having the other man act more submissive made him feel safer and eased his anxiety about the augs a good bit. Being in control made it seem less dangerous to play around like this.

Feeling emboldened by this realization, his hands got a bit more rough in their touch, starting to actually enjoy the firm carbon fibers under his fingers in contrast with the soft, pale skin. „Gonna be honest here, if we keep this up I‘ll have a hard time stopping.“

Reluctantly, Adam turned back around. „We don‘t have to stop.“ They could have some fun without stepping out of their comfort zone too much, save it for when they both really felt up to it instead of a spur of the moment.

Moving in closer until he was almost sitting on his team leader‘s lap, Adam smirked and slowly put his hands on Mac‘s shoulders, moving in for a kiss. The response he got was a bit more passionate than expected since the older man ended up pushing him down on the bed while they were making out.

Things got so intense for a few moments that they both startled when Jensen‘s re-breather aug activated itself due to the lack of fresh air going into his lungs while they kissed. „Now _that‘s_ a first.. Wait, does this mean you don‘t have to breathe the usual way while you blow-“

Not letting Mac finish that sentence, Adam pulled him close for another kiss, trying to stifle his own laughter. It was a bit too early for them to be thinking of creative uses for his augs in the bedroom yet.

Duncan almost faltered for a moment when he felt two strong, unyielding aug legs wrap themselves around his hips. But feeling Adam‘s cock rub against his own was a very good distraction. Enough so that he could focus on how good that felt and rutting his hips to get more friction between them.

Despite not having used any lube, they were sliding against each other smoothly thanks to the considerable amounts of precum Mac had ended up dripping over himself while fondling the other agent.

Reaching between them, Adam started to gently squeeze their dicks together with every stroke of his hand, causing them both to buck their hips in response until they got used to the feeling a bit more.

„ **Christ..** Don‘t stop now or I‘ll kill you.“ Duncan was pleading, the memory of that little stunt in the office still very fresh in his mind. If this stopped now he would die in agony. To his relief Jensen didn‘t have any shenanigans in mind right now. In fact, his mind was pretty blank except for the desire to get off.

Moving his hand faster, with a bit more pressure did the trick and they both came a lot faster than they usually would have. Looking each other in the eye, their breathing laboured neither of them could come up with anything witty to say.

Grabbing a tissue from the first drawer of his night stand, Adam cleaned up his hand before carefully cleaning both of them. Deciding that this was not the moment to talk, Duncan simply waited until they were both free of the sticky mess they had created and laid down, opening his arms to invite Adam to cuddle.

Invitation accepted they snuggled in close and let sleep overtake them. At least until Mac finally did break the silence.  
  


„That was some fine handiwork you did, agent.. Now about that breathing aug-“  
  
„ _Not now_. Go to sleep, Mac.“


	7. Revenge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally. :D
> 
> By the way, I'd like to thank all you lovely folks who have been leaving kudos and comments for me to enjoy :3  
> I write for fun, but it really warms my heart to see that people are liking my fic. Feel mightily hugged by me! c:

Maybe he wouldn‘t admit it out loud just yet, but Mac was definitely getting used to waking up with Jensen snuggled up against him. This time he had only frozen for about two seconds until his brain had caught up with reality.

It also did help that Adam kept gently rubbing over his chest, no matter if he was sleeping or not. It seems the agent really liked the upper body carpet Duncan was currently sporting since he quite simply didn‘t feel like shaving off the insulation against this godawful cold weather that nature had given him.

Smirking to himself he let Jensen play around some more and enjoyed the sound of a lonely dove outside the window cooing. People often claimed that Mac was never content because of his high standards at work, but that didn‘t mean he couldn‘t enjoy the small things in life anymore. Just that he didn‘t have much time for it while fighting terrorism and paperwork, the two greatest threats to peace.

And he‘d get right back to that... In a minute. His morning wood was urging him to move and take a leak but leaving the warm bed seemed like the worst idea ever to his delicate sensibilities.

At least until Adam shifted and unconsciously pressed one of his knees against Duncan‘s lower abdomen. NOPE. Time for an emergency evacuation.

It took some finesse to untangle himself from the sleeping aug and sneak over to the bathroom but it sure was worth it for the feeling of relief. Since he was in the bathroom already, he decided to take a quick shower. Halfway through his cleaning routine he suddenly sensed he was not alone in the bathroom and looked over his shoulder to find Adam standing there. „Mind if I join you? We could con-“  
  
„Don‘t even try that lame ‚conserving water‘-excuse, agent. Get your shiny ass in here if you want to have some company while cleanin‘ or don‘t.“ No, Mac really was not the kind of person who engaged in fluffy banter or flowery speech. Having served in the military for so long hadn‘t helped with that quirk either.

Since the shower stall was pretty roomy, they fit in there without having to squeeze together. They did anyway, because they were making up for years of having neglected and ignored their own desire to touch and be touched.

Somehow they still managed to get clean despite being mainly focused on groping each other and driving the water bill up.

Mac had been in the mood to show off and had hoisted Adam up against the tile wall. His leg had been in the mood to remind him that the weather had changed and that he was not 25 anymore. Making them almost end up on the floor of the shower stall when he yelped in pain and had to shift his weight, slowly letting Jensen back down to stand on his own.

„That sure was an impressive display of old age, MacReady.“  
  
„Shut your face, greenhorn.“

 

A moment of tense silence.

 

„Help me over to the couch already will ya?! And wipe that smirk out of your face. You‘ll be getting old next.“

\------

The two agents had snuggled in on the couch after some quick breakfast and Adam had been about to give Mac‘s hurting leg an apologetic massage when the home-media system fizzled up with a video call.

„Adam! I tried to get hold of you yesterday but you- _.. Why hello there._ “ Over-dramatic as usual, Sarif had done a triple take once he had spotted Adam kneeling, clad only with a towel, in front of a very naked Agent MacReady. After the whole thing with Orlov, they had reconnected a bit more and occasionally they had a pleasant chat here and there. But this was unexpected.

Duncan had been the one to interview Sarif on Adam‘s work at SI to make matters more awkward. „Oh crap.“  
  
Not picking up on the embarrassed mood coming from Prague, Sarif continued to prattle on with a huge smile on his face. „Good morning boys~ Well am I glad to see the two of you are getting along! I had the impression you weren‘t really fond of augs when we talked, agent, but-“  
  
Adam was currently fighting the urge to use the glass shield cloaking aug to disappear, but that would leave Duncan even more exposed than he already was since right now his head was blocking the view on Sergeant Mac Jr and his two support rounds. „David, could you call back later? _This is not a good time._ “

For a moment it seemed like his former boss was about to pout about being interrupted and redirected like this, but he relented when finally taking the time to notice that his favorite ex-employee was looking a bit tense.

„Fine. I‘ll call you later, son. There‘s some baseball games we need to catch up on. Francis just doesn‘t know a damn thing about the sport.. Stay safe and use protection, boys!“ The media system clicked off with a small crackling sound that alerted Jensen to the fact that Sarif must have bothered Pritchard to get a direct access route into the system. „I‘ll be having some words with Francis about giving him access to my home system later.. Are you okay, Mac?“

The older agent on the other hand was focused on something else. „Fucking christ, I was not ready to get caught by your dad yet. Give me a moment until I don‘t want to put a bullet in my head anymore, alright?“

Wait what? „ _.. My dad?_ You think Sarif is my father?“ Adam was doing his best not to break out in a laugh since he couldn‘t really blame him for not knowing. It was very rare that he mentioned his adoptive parents to anyone because of his fear of dragging them into danger and by now Adam was pretty sure that Sarif did see him as the child he never had. Truthfully he didn‘t exactly do anything to wean the man off that impression either.

„Are you sayin‘ he isn‘t?! Look I talked to him when Miller had us look into your credentials and he went on about you in a way that made me expect the guy to whip out embarrassing baby pictures any second! Even shed a tear when telling me about how much he valued your work at the company.“

Moving up to sit next to Duncan, Adam looked incredibly amused. Rubbing his eyes a little out of old habit, he chuckled. „If you thought that was dramatic, you should see him when his favorite baseball team looses. His office in Detroit had hidden, black mourning drapes just for that occasion.“

 

„ **Holy shit.** “

 

\------

At work things went more smoothly, thank god, and Adam used the relatively peaceful times to get some practice at the shooting range. At first he had been a bit incredulous when Aria had suggested that he should train, but since he mainly used his augs to deal with opposition Jensen was actually starting to get out of practice with lethal weaponry and that could be dangerous.

It was also a good way to let off some steam since showering together had actually fired him on more than give any relief. It was late so most of the agents were already heading homebound, aside from some of the analysts. But those rarely came in here.. Setting aside the small caliber pistol, Adam grabbed one of the high precision rifles and started aiming one shot after another-

At least he thought he was. But his hands were not responding to the commands from his brain and his vision was getting a bit fizzy. „What-“  
  
„You should be more careful, agent. I could have ended you right here.“ It took some effort to shift slightly so he could look under the counter at the shooting lane he was in. MacReady was looking incredibly smug about having caught him off-guard and he had put some strange-looking cuffs around Adam‘s ankles.

„The R&D Department send out some new prototypes a while ago.. I think you can guess what they are?“ Electromagnetic Pulse cuffs. With a frequency that was just low enough to not activate his emp protection system but high enough to render his limbs almost completely immobile. Quite impressive in terms of tech.

Mac got up from under the table and cuffed his hands to the weapon racks on the sides of the booth. How ironic. It left Jensen standing with his arms up and his legs spread like on one of those bondage crosses. Feeling self-conscious he squirmed a bit and noted that the cuffs were really sturdy.

„What are you gonna do to me?“ It wasn‘t easy to keep the tremor out of his voice. Being chained up like this usually was followed by something painful or unpleasant so Adam was a bit hesitant about this.

„Just gonna teach you a lesson about patience.. Don‘t worry I won‘t harm a single bolt or screw on your shiny ass. There‘s other ways to show you not to leave me hanging. Or _standing_ , to be accurate.“

This was still about the teasing back in the office? Sure, it hadn‘t been very nice to leave MacReady hard and wanting, but Adam had not expected the other agent to be this stubborn about it.

His arguments all died before he could voice them when Mac started to undo his body armor to expose his chest. „What if somebody walks in?!“ This was not a secluded spot at all. Jensen preferred shooting on the middle lane so he was in full view from the observation windows.

„Now you care about that, hm? When it‘s not my ass on the line.“ Duncan was standing close, their faces only about half an inch apart. „Didn‘t seem like there was anybody left who would want to come in here. Now let‘s get to business.. Remember our fancy safeword?“  
  
Swallowing heavily, Adam looked aside. It wasn‘t like he really was afraid of Mac hurting him, but this was different than having his hands bound with a scarf. This feeling of vulnerability left him jittery.

„Yes.“  
  
Fixing him with an intense look, Mac waited for a moment before urging him on. „Then say it out loud. We‘re not re-enacting Fifty Shades of Grey.“

„Teacup.“

„Well done. If you keep behaving like this I might be inclined to forgive you a bit faster than planned. But let‘s get you ready first.“

\-----

‚Getting him ready‘ involved taking off every piece of clothing aside from his boots and stashing away the weapons on the counter to replace them with a few toys and other tools. MacReady really was enjoying himself during this psychological warfare and was hell bent on making sure Adam would as well.

Up to a certain point..

At first he simply used his hands to touch, stroke and squeeze every bit of flesh he could get at to warm Adam up a little to this little playtime of theirs. „Do you have any idea how damn hard I was after your little stunt? I could have punched holes through concrete with my cock.“  
  
Underlining his point, he warmed up some lube between his palms before stroking Adam with steady firm strokes, occasionally stopping for a moment before continuing. „Mac, please..“

Duncan had never had any full-on sex with a guy before, hand jobs being the furthest line he‘d crossed, but he sure as hell knew all about getting a guy off with his hands for sure. Using his other hand, he rubbed two fingertips over the perineum, the sensitive skin behind Adam‘s nuts and before his ass until he found the spot where the nerves extended all the way up to the prostate gland from the outside.

Slowly increasing the pressure, he smirked when Jensen was starting to gasp and squirm around every time he pushed his fingers up against him. „Starting to regret your little stunt yet?“  
  
If he could talk right now, Adam would probably say something snappy. But the only noise coming out of his mouth right now were moans and the occasional small whine.

The tip of his cock was starting to get wet with precum and for a moment the younger man thought he‘d pass out when Mac teased him by rubbing the rough stubble on his face against his length before sucking on the head.

Almost, almost-

Suddenly everything came to a halt. No more sucking or pushing against that sensitive spot, no more stubble scratching against soft skin.

„Alright. See you in fifteen minutes. Gonna get a coffee and have a wank.“

Staring after Mac with a shocked expression, Adam could only groan and let his head hang in defeat.

There was definitely some heavy regret coursing through him by now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the cliffhanger but I try to keep chapters roughly the same length for consistency D:


	8. Intervention

Mac returned to the shooting range, cup of coffee in one hand and a bagel in the other. He knew better than to sneak or look around. That would only catch the interest of anyone who saw him.

It wasn‘t too far fetched that he would retreat to the range to have a snack and some silence in any case. Usually people didn‘t go there outside the scheduled practice times and the sound-proofing made it a respite from the constant chatter and beeping of the various computers and analysts in the main office space.

Moving in front of Adam, Duncan was very pleased that the aug looked rather sorry and was squirming around in his cuffs. „I‘m gonna guess you learned your lesson. What are you not going to do again?“ He prompted the other man with a smirk before taking a bite out of his bagel.

The ex-soldier was known for being extremely dedicated to everything he did. That included punishing cheeky agents as much as taking out terrorists.

„I‘m not going to tease you without following through again... Especially when Aria is around.“

The encouraging hand gesture coming from his team leader told Adam that he was not done apologizing yet. What else had he done wrong?  
  
_Oh_ , right.  
  
„Also, I am going to stop stealing your 10mm service pistol when I can‘t find my own.“

Thankfully that seemed to be enough to please Mac since he quickly finished his bagel and coffee ( ~~cold coffee was just not acceptable~~ ) before slicking one of his hands up with gun oil to jerk Adam‘s painfully hard cock off.

„You‘re lucky that wasn‘t my favourite pistol or I would have given you the spanking of your life, even if I break my damn hand on your shiny arse!“ Moving down to kneel in front of his tied up co-worker, he only stroked him slowly at first to avoid overstimulating him right out of the box after having been on edge for so long. Once certain that Adam was no in pain, Mac gave himself a mental shove to stop being insecure about this and took the tip of the hard cock in front of his face in his mouth, letting himself get used to the taste and feel. It's not like he was new to this sort of thing, it was not hard to recall what he still remembered from certain nights in the desert where he and his squad mates had occasionally taken care of each other this way. It had just been quite a while since he'd last sucked a dick.

Jensen was sorely tempted to snark back at the older man, but decided it was smarter to put on an apologetic face and be silent while Duncan literally had him in his power. As soon as he felt Duncan suck him off, any sort of wit or sharpness fled his mind as quickly as it had appeared. Since he had been on edge for quite a while now, it did not take long for Adam to come with a hoarse groan, his legs almost giving out under him. Duncan was surprised at himself that he actually swallowed, never having done so before, but this was certain to be less of a mess at least.

As fiercely strict as the experienced agent tended to be, he also had a caring side that few people got to see. Dragging teammates out of danger and protecting civilians, or in this case, taking care of the agent he just taught a rough lesson and getting him back onto his feet. MacReady might not be what most people would call a pleasant person, but as far as Adam had seen he was an attentive lover and his honesty made him more likeable to the aug than any sort of social pleasantry would.

Quickly cleaning his hands first, Duncan went on to making sure he was free of any incriminating spots and then carefully freed Adam of the EMP-cuffs. After helping him redress and packing the cuffs back into their bag, Mac moved in close. They had fooled around some, shared a bed and made out. But a real emotion-fueled kiss to express feelings hadn't happened yet. Or was it too early to get into this sort of stuff? How did this even work between two men outside of a quick fling? .. For now they were just staring into each other's eyes and enjoying each other's presence.

Neither of them knew that from this moment on, they were being watched. A nosy pair of eyes was scrutinizing their interactions through the viewing window. Dr. Auzenne could not tell that they had just engaged in some rather kinky shenanigans before since Mac had made sure to get the evidence sorted out quickly.

What she saw was the team leader of the counter-terrorism and organized crime units invading another agent‘s space way past any line that was given in workplace etiquette. Duncan‘s bold and sometimes outright aggressive body language did not help dissuade her from her analysis that Adam was being threatened. Something that could interfere with the plans certain people had for the augmented agent.

Immediately she sent a text to Jim Miller that would set off a chain of events nobody could have foreseen.

......

When Mac came into the HQ the next morning he already had a bad feeling when greeted by a very displeased looking Jim Miller. „We need to have a talk, Mac.“ It wasn‘t like he could say no to the director of TF29 no matter if they were friends or not, so Duncan grudgingly followed Miller into his office and felt even more unsettled when he spotted Dr. Auzenne standing in a corner giving him one of those awful fake sympathetic smiles.

„Mac, you said you would tell me if there are any more problems between you and Jensen!“

Jim was not happy. Duncan on the other hand was very confused by this sudden outburst. „There is no-“ before he could finish his sentence, Jim cut him off, sounding rather strained.

„Delara told me she saw you threatening Jensen in the shooting range last night! **How is that not a problem**?!“

Looking like a deer in the headlights, the agent looked over to Auzenne who simply gave him a stern look in return. What had she seen? .. Crap. Feeling cornered like this had the effect of making him lash out in self-defense.

„I don‘t see why we need a shrink spying on us! We‘re grown men, we can just do this-“  
  
Getting cut off once again, this was really starting to piss him off, Mac grumbled and crossed his arms.

„No, you are not doing this ‚ _your way_ ‘, Mac. We are not in the army any more. You and Adam are going to to see Delara until you figure out how to actually act like grown ups. I will not have my agents threaten each other like teenagers in the school yard. Is that clear?“

Even if he told Jim now, he wouldn‘t believe that Mac had given Adam a rather nice hand job before ‚ _threatening_ ‘ him as Delara had perceived it. This was going to be a pain in the ass.

„... Clear. Am I dismissed, Sir?“

Talking back to Miller when he was this pissed off was not a good idea. As soon as he saw Jim give a tense nod, he was out of there and retreated to his office to rub his face in agitation. Just great. Exactly what he needed when already stressed with running two teams at the same time!

......

Adam was going through his usual daily schedule, figuring that Mac was holed up in his office like usually. Boy, was he wrong.

Since he had been identified as the ‚aggressor‘ in the conflict between him and Jensen, Duncan had been given the questionable privilege of being taken apart by Auzenne first before any sessions with both of them involved happened..

After an awkward silence the psychologist started talking.

„Director Miller ordered me to stage an intervention between the two of you and counsel your interpersonal relationship to an acceptable level. This will be much faster and less tedious if you decide to work along with me instead of against me.“  
  
Giving her the best stink eye he could muster, Duncan was sitting on the couch looking both miserable and angry. He knew he could not say no to being forced into this intervention, but that did not mean he had to like it or roll over like a trained dog. Especially since he didn‘t trust this shrink any more than all the others. Especially with that annoying fake smile she wore all the time.

„Alright then, Duncan. Would you like to start by telling me why you were invading Adam‘s personal space?“

Mac had a hard time to keep himself from smirking. _‚Oh, well Doc. I was just getting the guy off and was contemplating on expressing some feelings when you decided to spy on us‘_ was not going to go over well as an answer. Thinking for as moment he let out a sigh. „.. It was an impulse reaction. I can‘t really explain it.“

Already she was typing on that pocket secretary of hers.. It made him antsy.

„Are you willing to work on your relationship with Adam?“  
  
„Why not! It‘s not like I‘m doing anything else that is useful at the moment after all, right?“ Being kept from his work definitely soured his mood to a saltiness level that would have most of the agents in the buildings flee from him. They knew better than to bait MacReady when he was not willing to socialize.

„What have you tried so far to make amends with Adam? And do you feel you can communicate with him properly?“

Before the psychologist could react, Mac had jumped up from the couch and slammed both of his hands on her desk with such force that the sound echoed through the small room. „Listen to me lady, I know what your kind does and what you want to achieve with those questions. Went through marriage counselling three fucking times because I let myself be convinced that pretty words and bullshit like this solves problems. It doesn‘t! You‘re just wasting my time and patience.“

_She was smiling at him._

_Dear god_ , what he would give for being allowed to hit her without any consequences.

„It‘s good that you are letting out your emotions, Duncan. Please sit down when you are ready and we can continue.“  
  
This was going to be a long, tedious therapy session.

After about ten minutes, some analysts were sure they heard some furniture being broken.

.....

"Man, did you hear? The boss sacked in Mac for some therapy sessions."  
  
"Seriously? Who is going to scrape Auzenne off the walls when he snaps?"  
  
Adam usually tuned out gossip from other agents. Especially when it concerned his team and was not of consequence for a mission. But that tidbit made his attention spring over to them immediately. That would explain why he hadn't seen Duncan fetch himself coffee or a snack all day like usually.

Grabbing his work pocket secretary he sent Mac a message in SMC, the standardized military code that had been in use since 2020, asking him what happened. It took several minutes for his team leader to answer and Adam couldn't help a small laugh when he saw the reply.

What Jensen got as an answer was a quickly made, blurry snapshot of a hand flipping him off. _Charming_. Translating it from MacReady to polite it probably meant that his team leader was in a bad mood and didn't have the time to type an explanation at the moment.

He send him another message asking him if he wanted to meet in the Red Queen tonight to talk and got a thumbs up in return.

Hopefully that would shed some light on the situation.

Until then he tried to work on helping out the Organized Crime department, seeing as the agents there had to go without their team leader for so long and seemed a bit lost. Having been in charge of more than one team before, Adam was not unfamiliar with rousing people to work together and managed to puzzle together a very promising lead on something that the Dvali were involved in. A lead that might put a big enough hole in their business to actually do some long-term damage to their shady dealings.

Feeling eager about his discovery, Jensen decided to present the lead to Mac later when they were meeting. Maybe it would cheer the other agent up to do some actual field work again instead of being stuck in his office all day.

Time seemed to move slower than normal and when it was finally time to pack up and leave for the Red Light District, Adam found himself to be uncharacteristically impatient.

Mac was obviously exhausted from the ordeal that happened today, but also curious what had the usually so stoic aug in such a tizzy. Having taken the time to freshen up a little, he already felt a bit less awful and made his way over to the meeting spot they had agreed on, the VIP Lounge.

Unfortunately, the bars both in the main floor and upstairs were packed full tonight and since Adam wanted to discuss the lead on the Dvali they would need some privacy, so they ended up paying for a private room no matter how red-faced they both ended up when the young lady handling the rooms told them where to find condoms, lube and other supplies before winking at them.  
  
The room was spacious and there really were supplies of all kind packed into the drawers. Jensen was rarely able to resist rummaging through drawers and desks so he ended up finding some rather interesting sex toys, lube, massage oil and pretty much everything one would need for a **very** kinky evening.

"Alright, what have you got?" Mac had been standing around in the middle of the room but decided that he might as well sit on the big plushy bed if they paid for it.  
  
"Cherry, banana, strawberry... _Bacon?!_ That is disgusting."  
  
"... **The lead,** Jensen."  
  
"I found a way to kneecap the Dvali human trafficking."

_"Holy shit."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy moly. This was long overdue. I apologize both to Adam for giving him blue balls for so long, and to you all for making you wait so much D: I hope you like the new chapter, even if it leaves some questions unanswered :D Such is the way of a slow-burn story hehe
> 
> Hopefully there are no terrible grammar mistakes or anything. I only have myself as a beta-reader D: If you find something I would be glad if you told me in the comments :3  
> Note: I made some small tweaks to hopefully improve the readability of the chapter some more :)


	9. Getting to Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I originally planned for this to be a pure mission chapter, but I cannot put those two in a kinky bedroom and not have something happen at least :D

 It was a mixture of solid work from the Organized Crime Unit, luck and Adam‘s critical eye for connections that had given them this particular gem.

„We have the needed information and evidence to grab one of the major players in the human trafficking business here in Europe. The guy calls himself Bartolomej Novak. He‘s going to meet with the Dvali in two weeks, likely to discuss the direction of their business when the Restoration Acts fails to pass.“

Rummaging through the pockets of his long coat, Adam managed to find the picture of the suspect he had printed out for Mac, knowing that he‘d like to see the culprit. „... Are you shitting me?!“

Adam raised his eyebrows in confusion and inclined his head. He had expected Duncan to be happy and not look pissed off at knowing the likeness their main target.

„Did you forget him already? This asshole treated you like an aug whore when we were out drinking at the Red Queen a while ago. Now I've got a legally sound reason to kick his ass. Gonna need to work on an assault strategy and get the locations sorted. First-“ He tried to get up but was stopped by the firm grip of a shiny metal hand.

„ _No_. You are going to stay put.“

Now it was MacReady‘s turn to be confused. The other agent was giving him a stern look and seemed rather unimpressed with his ambition to quickly get a strike team together and ready to hit their perpetrator.

„Wha-“

„The meeting is in two weeks Mac. You can afford to lay down for a bit and rest before you throw yourself back into work. When did you last sleep more than thirty minutes? And no, collapsed over your desk does not count.“

Blinking a few times, Duncan was unsure how to react. He wasn‘t used to anyone caring about his well being as long as he functioned. Pushing himself way past his limits was how he‘d come this far and what he‘d been awarded a bunch of shiny medals for. It gave him an odd sort of twinge in his chest that Jensen seemed to actually be interested in more than just a carnal workplace fling.

„Just take your clothes off, get comfortable and let me properly make up for my unfair teasing in the office, okay?“

As a dutiful agent and stubborn bastard of a guy, Mac was more than just a bit tempted to say _‚fuck no‘_ and get his ass back to the HQ to sift through the tactical data of this wonderful discovery. Finally having something that could actually leave a dent in the Dvali armour was reason enough to go into overdrive.

But it was also really hard to decline when Jensen was making both a good point and an enticing offer in one sweet deal. Sighing a little, he rubbed his tired eyes and glanced around the kinky bedroom they were currently having a discussion in. The club music from the first floor was just audible enough to make a nice ambiance without being annoying. The way-too-fancy decor was offending Mac‘s rather spartan sense of style a bit, but it wasn‘t the most garish room he‘d ever been in either.

„... And you don‘t want to make use of any of this stuff? We paid for it after all.“ Unlike Adam, Duncan did have a vigorous sex drive and was pretty much always ready to rock when the opportunity arose. Unless he was drunk. Whiskey dick was a phenomenon that did not just occur when drinking whiskey.

„Another time, maybe. Right now you look like you‘d fall asleep the moment you hit the bed.“

Grumbling slightly and suspiciously eyeing some of the more adventurous toys on the bedside table closest to him, Duncan started undressing while Adam crossed his arms and watched him. Being naked with the other man still completely dressed was making Mac uncomfortable so he gave the aug‘s coat an impatient tug before moving to lay down on the bed and closing his eyes.

„Get your kit off or you won‘t see me relaxing anytime soon, mate.“

He had expected Jensen to cuddle in with him and have a nap together. But his expectations were being subverted, startling Duncan a bit when instead of the bed covers he felt something liquid and warm drip onto his chest. Opening his eyes he immediately knew what it was. Massage Oil.

There was a by now familiar pinch of fear running through him when two augmented hands started gently rubbing the oil into his skin, as well as giving his pectoral muscles a light squeeze, but it was a good sign that his anxiety didn‘t last as long as before. It was an unusual situation for Mac. The only massages he had received so far were either therapeutic ones by medical personnel or the kind one pays for.  
  
But Adam did not touch him like a patient or customer. At least Duncan was pretty sure that no doctor had every played with his nipples before. And if it had happened, he didn‘t want to know about it.

„So, do you have a massage aug as well? Because I think I might need to have some words with Sarif about his intentions if you do.“

All he got in reply was a low chuckle.

God damn, was it hard to just relax. In fact, Mac was not sure he even knew how to do it any more. At least without help. It was not uncommon for trained spec ops operatives to have lifelong problems with their sleeping patterns and other vital functions needed to let their bodies rest. Duncan usually retained some basic reflexes that had been honed over many years of service and saved his life, as well as others, more than once.

Apparently this was becoming evident to Adam as well, judging by his concerned expression.

„Your muscles are so bunched up I‘m not sure I can actually do much to help.“ Not because he couldn‘t press down hard enough, mind you. No, the opposite actually. Jensen would end up hurting Mac quite a bit if he really tried to work those knots out with too much force.

„Don‘t worry about it. That‘s normal for me.“

It shouldn‘t be left unsaid that Adam could be rather stubborn himself when he had set his mind to something. And right now he wanted Duncan to relax and feel good. After gently urging Mac to turn over and coating his hands in even more massage oil, he started working on the various knots and bunched muscles trying his best to not cause too much pain while he worked.

„NHHHHhh.. fucking hell. _OW!_ “

Yes, it hurt quite a bit still and a few times it was outright agony to work through all those painful spots that MacReady normally ignored. But once Adam was done unscrambling his muscles, he felt both twenty years younger and as if he had turned to putty. A sweaty, oiled up pile of putty, actually.

Which was probably why it took him a solid two minutes to notice that Adam was spending a suspiciously long time kneading his ass now that he was relaxed. There was also no way in hell that he‘d admit the tingly sensation down his spine that very motion was giving him. These days most people didn‘t really go by those old clichés of masculine tops and effeminate bottoms any more. But Duncan was still part of the generation who had. Coming to terms with the more modern definition of desires to have sex in a certain way being separate from both gender and dominance was yet another project to undertake.

„Just so you‘re warned, I‘m gonna break your bollocks if you try to enter any restricted areas back there.“ And if Mac sounded a bit strained saying this, it was simply because of exhaustion and not because he was aroused. Nope. Not even a bit.

The other agent smirked when his social enhancer aug piped in with an alarm about unusual pheromone activity. CASIE could not properly detect arousal on it‘s own since sexual responses had many more variations than other basic reactions like fear or anger, but it could give hints about pheromones and heart frequency. Leaving the final verdict of what it meant to Adam. „Just enjoying the view. But I‘ll keep in mind to ask you for the password before I try the back door.“

As long as he did just that, Mac was perfectly fine with being groped and looked at. Even if he did end up turning rather red-faced when he felt two carbon-fiber thumbs spread his muscular cheeks apart to give a far more intimate view for Jensen to enjoy. One that only one other person had enjoyed before in this detail..

Duncan heard a small sound of surprise from Adam and sighed. The reason for the surprise was a small non-metallic ring adorning the rosy skin on the agent‘s perineum, about halfway between his nuts and the ‚back door‘ as Adam had eloquently put it just a few moments ago.

„Yes, I have a piercing back there. Get over it.“

Judging by the silence and even more intense kneading to his backside it seemed like Adam was not willing to get over it at all. Just when the aug was about to ask about it, he got cut off.

„My second ex-wife happened to be a tattoo and body mod artist and I let her practice on me when she started doing more intimate jewellery. Ended up keeping it because it‘s not in the way during missions.. Look I‘m glad you‘re liking the panorama back there, but I‘d appreciate if you would come closer and hold me for a while.“

„You know, you can just tell me when you‘re embarrassed, Duncan.“

„I‘m not-“

„You look like a cherry and I can hear your teeth grinding, so don‘t even bother.“

Jensen made himself comfortable next to his lover, it still felt a bit too early and sort of weird to say that, but what else should he call Mac? That was a question for when they both were less tired and there was less work ahead of them.

„Hey, thanks for the massage.“

His thanks went unheard since Adam had actually fallen asleep first for once.

\------

The next day the TF29 Headquarters was abuzz with agents and analysts rushing to follow the orders coming from Mac while Miller dealt with getting the necessary clearance they would need. He had gotten the green light from Miller to start preparing an assault to take Novak into their custody. Since they had to grab him alive this was going to be a lot more complicated than simply sending a strike team to shoot everything down. Not to mention that the Mafia tended to be both well-armed and careful.

Furthermore there was the danger of innocent civilians being on-site since those meetings apparently served as a market for special goods.. Meaning enslaved augs with either interesting mods or special skills.

At the moment Duncan was staring at his screen, the image of the abandoned mansion where the most devious criminal scum of Eastern Europe, along with their main target Novak, was about to meet his current project. It was being sharply scrutinized for possible entry points, tactical advantages and other useful information.

A few promising spots were already marked, but he was unsure if they should really risk catching unwanted attention by sending a whole strike team and rather do this as a duo or trio group mission.

One thing was for sure, MacReady was going to come along and take part in catching the big fish. Not just because the office hours were driving him nuts, but also because he was still irked by the guy‘s behaviour towards Adam the other night. Usually he kept his personal feelings out of his work, but Duncan wasn‘t perfect. He was human.

And it didn‘t matter whether he was a big mafia guy or some bum on the street, nobody treats his team members like that under his watch. Not to mention that he might be a tiny bit biased towards Jensen.. But that was something he was still not ready to accept yet.

Putting on his infolink headset, Duncan gave Chang a quick call. Mainly because he disliked the chat application that most other agents used to share quick info or requests. „Chang, I need your analysis ready in thirty minutes or heads will roll.“ After a moment of reflection he added. „Don‘t take that literally, mate. Mac out.“ It was best the paranoid cyber-specialist was not actually expecting to be beheaded. You never knew with that guy..

Being so very concentrated on his work, he only noticed that Aria had walked in when he was shaken out of his focused haze by the scent of freshly made coffee. „I brought along the new data from the surveillance team. Well..“ Her troubled tone made him squint his eyes at the young woman.

„What is it Aria?“

„.. I think Adam went off to scout out the location on his own, sir. Vitek and Marco report that he didn‘t meet with them in the agreed spot and that there has been some activity on-site.“

„Good fucking christ!“

Jensen‘s private infolink channel was in non-contact mode. That could only mean that he was deep into enemy territory by now.

Storming over to Miller‘s office, he smacked his hands down on the desk, startling the director enough to almost make him spill his tea.

„What the hell, Mac?!“

„I need to move out, **NOW**!“

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to techno4tomcats for beta-reading over the already posted chapters as well as the new one to help me improve them~
> 
> Also check out this sweet fanart from undying_lord_mar_vell showing us the nice view Adam received by mail after their first night out together ;D  
> https://68.media.tumblr.com/3572411256515494c14690bf4ce0bea0/tumblr_inline_omq2xgkbGO1qjeqqs_540.jpg


	10. Adrenaline

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time for some action, folks :)

 Miller looked increasingly uncomfortable with each moment Mac stared him down with his hands on the desk. He knew that MacReady would not ask to move out immediately without a damn good reason. But they had orders from way up high in the chain of command.

„Mac, I‘m sorry but you can‘t. There has been an incident at the Turkish Embassy here in Prague and we need your team there to handle-“

Gritting his teeth, Duncan only heard about half of what his old friend was telling him, because he was currently concentrating on not saying anything that would get him into trouble. Their friendship was carefully kept separate from their work as much as they could. A long standing agreement between them to avoid misunderstandings.

„I know this is unusual but.. would you brief my team and let me go alone?“ To be honest, Mac was as surprised to hear these words come out of his mouth as Jim currently was. They stared at each other for a few moments before Miller handed him a special debrief document that was used for unplanned early deployment. „Only this once, Mac. I trust you to know what you are doing. And since I already strained your good faith in me with handing you two departments, I owe you one.“

Relief flooded through him like a wave, only to be replaced with tension. Sending a single agent to extract another was usually against their rules unless the target was undercover. But what choice did they have? The other strike teams were either deployed or had too many agents out of commission to be sent out. There better be some champagne and a damn good blow job waiting for him when he returned. But that depended on whether he actually managed to get Jensen out of there without getting sacked himself.

Speeding down to the armory MacReady worked himself into his combat gear as quick as he could manage. That damn utility belt was pinching his man parts something awful but Mac ignored it in favor of making sure he had what he needed and picked a tranquilizer rifle, a stun gun and enough ammo for both. With civilians having been confirmed on-site he couldn‘t risk any unwanted casualties.

Since Chikane would be flying his team out to the Embassy, he had to get to the target location on land. One of the security officers would serve as his driver. Fortunately Miller had quickly given the guy a run-down of where they were going so they immediately took off as soon as his backside touched the seat.

This was all sorts of messed up and risky. Why the fuck did he have to care about this unreasonable, disobedient mess of an agent so much? Jensen was acting like the protagonist of a damn videogame, going in all alone against an army of Mafia thugs. Like a really weird modern-era version of 300. Shaking himself out of his angry musings, he loaded his weapons, making sure the mechanism on the rifle was functioning normally and wouldn‘t jam on him in the heat of a shoot-out. Since he had neither a fucking clue where Adam actually was on-site or what he was aiming for, Duncan was essentially going in blind. Sure, he had studied the general layout of the mansion and the entry and exit points, but due to the sudden lack of time there had been no way for him to plan out him movement or possible evasion routes in case he was met with something stopping him from going onward.

„ETA 15 minutes.“

Right now he was really grateful that Rodriguez was driving him because the guy was the silent type and unlikely to rile him up with some well-meant but poorly timed comment. The closer they got to the deployment point, the more his stomach clenched up with dread that maybe he was already too late and they had turned Jensen into scrap already. There was slavery, yes. But many augs still ended up being harvested to steal their tech if it looked expensive enough. And Sarif prototype augs would be like hitting the lottery jackpot for a black market dealer..

„ETA 5 minutes. Sir, I know this is not allowed.. But I could come with-“

„ _No._ I need you to stand by in case things go downhill. I will give you the standard signal when I've found Jensen. If I don‘t because of a jammed signal or because I‘m busy fighting my way through there, expect me to arrive in retreat zone A within two hours. If I don‘t, you drive back to HQ and tell them I fucked up and that they need two new department heads and a new robo cop.“

„Sir..“

„That‘s how it‘s gonna be. Are we clear?“

„Understood."

As soon as the car stopped, he opened the door and made his way over to the large mansion. Once the car was out of sight, Duncan took a deep breath to center himself before using the thermal scope on his rifle to watch some guards from the bush he was hiding in currently. It was still dark so at least he wouldn‘t have to worry much about blending in with his surroundings and just keep to the shadows.

It had been almost two decades since his last solo deployment. MacReady was a team player, somebody who knew how to steer the dynamics of different people towards a goal. Solo infiltration was something he had never particularly excelled in, mainly because of his hot temper that tended to run off bounds when he did not have a team to watch over and the fact that he quite simply tended to have issues with having to sneak around. Not because he wasn‘t stealthy, but staying in kneeled positions for long times tended to mess with his bad leg too much.

Sending out a small drone from the main bag on his belt that could be cloaked with the same glass shield tech that Adam sported, Duncan tried to get a better view of the security measures in place. Letting the small device circle the main building before returning to the guards closest to him, things were not looking good. His Czech was far better than Adam‘s after living in Prague for several years, so he managed to understand from the conversation between the thugs, that apparently there had been an assault from an aug. That immediately set off his alarm bells.. Did Jensen get caught? Was he being held in a cell?

The vast grounds around the main building hadn‘t been tended to in years. Not pretty, but giving him plenty of vegetation to sneak through. Close to the door of the balcony to the right side of the house, Mac spotted a dog chained to a post. Moving as slowly as possible, he advanced towards the edge, praying that the dog was not going to bark. All other entrances into the building had at least two guards that seemed to be checking in with each other via radio. If one didn‘t answer..

Surprise was about the only advantage he had.

Thankfully the supposed guard dog was a really old shepherd dog who only gave him a tired, questioning look before wagging his tail a bit and finally returned to taking a nap instead of bothering with the agent. Putting his ear against the door first, Mac was pretty sure that the room was empty. No voices, no footsteps.. A multi-tool made quick work of the locked door.

What he saw inside made the hairs on his neck stand up in agitation. Five tied up and gagged women had been stashed under the kitchen table like ordinance.. No. Not Women.   
  
_Girls._ They couldn‘t be older than thirteen or fourteen at most and all seemed to be augmented in some way from what was visible. But he couldn‘t get them out of here right now. They could end up alarming the guards and fuck the whole operation over. Gritting his teeth the agent sneaked in closer to carefully remove their gags and hoped they could speak one of the languages he happened to know.  
  
_„Mluvíte česky?“_ (Do you speak Czech?)

Nobody nodded. But maybe they were in shock. It wouldn‘t be far-fetched, considering they were caught in a Mafia trading post.  
  
_„Rozumíte? Mluví tam někdo anglicky?“_ (Do you understand? Can anyone speak English?)

The youngest looking of the bunch slowly answered him. From this close Duncan could see that all of the girls had huge pupils and looked either ill or drugged. Judging from the slow reactions and weird stares he got, drugged seemed like the more likely option.   
  
_„Jmenuji se Kveta. Bolí mě hlava.“_ (My name is Kveta. I have a headache.)

Considering his option and very limited resources he had to make a choice. If he managed to find Adam it would be considerably more easy to extract the girls as well. _„Neboj se. Musíš zůstat, to nejhorší už máme za sebou. Opravdu bych měl jít však vrátím se dnes večer.“_ (Don‘t be afraid. You have to stay, the worst is over. I really ought to go but I will be back tonight.  
  
_„Vypadáš jako policista.. Někdo má potíže! Jeden policista.“_ (You look like a cop. Somebody is in trouble! Another policeman.) 

Finally something that could help him find Adam. He nodded to signal Kveta to keep talking. Maybe she had seen the agent? People generally seemed to pick up on the fact that he had been a cop just by looking at him.  
  
_„Vím, kde jsou. Ten sklepení. Je pro něj příliš pozdě.“_ (I know where they are. The basement. It‘s too late for him.)  
  
_„To pravděpodobně není pravda. Díky.“_ (That is likely not true. Thanks.) Duncan wasn‘t going to let himself believe this or he might as well give up now. No, Jensen had survived worse things. He had to be alive.

Carefully the agent replaced the gags so the girls wouldn‘t get punished for not wearing them or alert anyone to his presence. Duncan made his way over to the direction that Kveta had indicated the basement to be in with her head.

Lucky for him, it seemed like most of the people involved in this place where in the big dining room, leaving the way to the basement mostly free. Mac was forced to wait until the guard that was standing near the hatch leading down to the basement finally finished his smoking break and walked on to patrol the rest of the hallway.

Every step down felt like somebody squeezed a hand around his heart. What was in this basement? Would he find the remains of taken apart augs and end up having to bring back whatever was left of Adam? Since MacReady was a counter-terrorism specialist and usually not involved in Organized Crime until recently, he hadn‘t dealt with harvesters and aug slavery this closely before. Step by step he made his way down, not turning on any lights and only using the thermal scope to find his way instead. There were some weak heat signatures on various tables. Seeing an augmented arm that still had flesh chunks on it almost managed to make him gag and loose his nerves.

Slowly moving on, trying his best to ignore the familiar ache in his bad leg that set in after sneaking around for a while, Duncan moved through the surprisingly large basement area. Aside from the main room there were several hallways down here and it smelled like a battlefield. The coppery tang of blood as well as the unmistakable stench of decay hung around these rooms like a disgusting veil. Finding a strong heat signature in the last room down the corridor Mac switched to the stun gun as it was more suited for close-rang combat and moved on by carefully feeling out his way with one hand.

Shaking slightly, he opened the door to the small room, a sheen of sweat covered his forehead, caused by all the doubts in his mind and-

His face switched from the expression of tension to straight up disbelief.

Duncan let go of the breath he had been holding out of sheer anxiety and was not sure if he was having hallucinations or if the universe was trying to pull his leg. Visible from the door was Adam leaning over the body of an unconscious person, it was too dark to identify them, binding some old rope around the wrists of the aforementioned man. Turning on the torch attached to the left shoulder of his tactical vest, Duncan was able to recognize that it was their target, Novak.

The light alerted Adam to his presence, who despite the radar on his HUD had been too busy concentrating on getting the target ready to travel to notice the lone figure approach him.

Jensen expected his team leader to insult and yell at him for rushing in ahead, but what he got instead was **_much_** worse. After giving him a seething glare that would have caused most people to piss themselves, Duncan turned around and left the storage room without uttering a single word in his direction. 

Having been so focused on unearthing the illuminati threat, Adam often lost sight of what his actions may look like or feel to other people who were not involved with the Juggernaut Collective or knew about his primary goal.

Slinging the target that he had knocked out with sleeping gas over his shoulder, he followed the other agent to the kitchen with the tied up civilians staying silent as well. It was odd to hear MacReady speak Czech but they seemed to understand him well enough. After talking to the girls, his team leader activated the infolink and gave through a message.

„Mac here. Move to extraction zone B, Rodriguez. We have possibly drugged civilians to bring along with us.“

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohhhh cliffhanger D: Sorry about that but it turned out this way. Adam dun goof'd. This is gonna be fun once they arrive at HQ..
> 
> Beta-reading was done by techno4tomcats c: Check out their writing as well. It's A++


	11. Mercy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam gets worked over in this chapter. Not the way he prefers to, however. c:

Since neither Duncan nor Adam were particularly good at dealing with traumatised teenage girls, Aria took over handing them to the correct authorities and watched over them as long as they had to wait for the transport from Social Security. They would bring them home, if they had one, or bring them to a shelter until the administration put them into a facility that would keep them safe and cared for them.

After getting out of his tactical kit, MacReady motioned for Jensen to follow him and made his way up to his office. A few people who had been working on the analytics for the abruptly disrupted mission winced. They knew that things hadn‘t gone tits-up since Miller would have been walking circles into his office if it had, but that Mac was angry was apparent, as well as the fact that it was dark outside at night.

Quickly nodding his head at the door, the older man waited until Jensen was inside to follow him and locked the door, activating the ‚Do not disturb except for emergencies‘ Holo-Light message on his door.

Adam was still hoping that Mac would start to yell at him any moment. Something familiar that he knew how to deal with. But this tense silence and the multiple warnings his CASIE aug was giving him, did not exactly fill him with hope that he would be let off easy or even be able to say anything to make amends in this situation. At least not until his team leader had calmed down considerably.

Instead of talking, Duncan started filling out a few forms only stopping to take a sip of water from the bottle he had stashed in one of the drawers on his desk. An outsider would probably have thought that he was concentrated or even calm. But the way his jaw was clenched and the fiery expression in his eyes gave away the inner tornado going through his mind.

Aside from being irresponsible and ruining his careful planning, Adam had done something Duncan had sworn himself not to let happen any more after his third failed marriage.

Adam had hurt his feelings.

The ache of feeling misplaced, ignored and unappreciated hurt more than any wounds he had received before. Right now he was wishing that he only had to deal with an incendiary round in his leg again. It seemed like a walk in the park compared to the violent roller-coaster of emotions going through his head right now. After taking several deep breaths, he was actually able to form sentences in his head that did not throw all basic human decency and professionalism overboard.

„You absolute fucking bastard.“ Okay. this version of his first sentence was not entirely professional either but he had to say something to let off some steam before he exploded in worse ways.

Jensen had never been so god damn grateful for those shades on his face before. He wasn‘t sure he could actually meet MacReady‘s eyes without catching unholy fire right now. The ex-cop made a mental note to send Sarif some flowers and chocolate for father‘s day this year.

„If you think you can worm yourself into my heart and ask me to trust you, before doing the exact opposite with shitting all over what I do, what I work and stand for without consequences you must have some major fucking delusions, mate. I wasn‘t born yesterday and it‘s about fucking time I gave you a reality check. I know Miller won‘t stop me after I report what exactly you did in the post-mission report.“

Until now Miller had intervened every attempt Duncan had made to include Adam into the regular team exercises and activities aside from missions because of his special snowflake status, being the most augmented and stealth-experienced agent in the division as well as having joined Interpol under unusual circumstances. But those times were about to be over. They would never be a proper team unless Jensen started acting like he was actually part of it.

Slowly he got up from his office chair and advanced into Adam‘s personal space until they were almost nose to nose. „I expect you in the gym at 5am tomorrow. Now get your shiny arse out of my office before I do something we‘re both gonna regret.“

\------

The next day, MacReady was already at the gym at 4:30 in the morning, getting himself warmed up in his own pace. Since there was no room for training facilities in the TF29 Headquarters, they had reworked an old basement dance studio that used to be the training space for Prague‘s ballet professionals into a gym with ample space for tactical training as well as general fitness. It wasn‘t far from the HQ thankfully. Field agents needed to be in top shape and Close Quarters Combat or infiltration training was just as mandatory as handling a gun properly.

Going through his second set of push-ups, Duncan tried to focus on keeping himself balanced and moving in a steady pace. It was true that he wasn‘t quite as bulky as he used to be when in his 20‘s serving in the regular army, but that didn‘t mean that he was out of shape. Whenever Mac was not working or engaging in pleasantries like going out for drinks, he was found either at the gym or at home working on keeping himself fit. 

Furthermore, as a soldier, he had been a specialist for heavy weaponry before switching to recon and assault after injuring his leg in Ankara. Back then he had needed a lot of bulk to carry weapons like the now outdated FGM 148 Javelin Anti-Tank missile and occasionally a mortar or flamethrower.

Now that he was slowly reaching an age where his physical capabilities were starting to decline from their maximum, Duncan had been even more determined than before to keep himself well-trained in an effort to keep up with his younger team members. Many team leaders and department chiefs liked to sit back and yell orders from the sidelines, but he wasn‘t like that. Yelling orders in the middle of action was what he was made for.

After finishing the last set of push-ups and switching to squats, he noticed that he was not alone any more. Stopping mid-motion in a low squat, he noted the new arrival even though his back was facing the door thanks to the big mirror used to control form while exercising in front of him. „Well somebody‘s early. It won‘t earn you any points in my book unless you stop oogling my arse and get in your gear, Agent.“

Adam let out a loud sigh and somewhat reluctantly moved back to the small locker room to change into the standard regulation sports wear issued for all TF29 agents. Which was one of the main reasons he had asked Miller to exempt him from the gym activities all this time. It consisted of a pair of short black shorts and a simple mesh-fiber shirt. Very comfortable and lightweight..

But also rather short and leaving most of his augs exposed in a way that he was not comfortable with at all. It was different to stride around naked at home where he was usually alone and didn‘t have to think about being looked at. Some of the other agents weren‘t exactly pro-aug, even if none of them were radical or outright bigoted. That still didn‘t mean they would be friendly or totally understanding of Adam‘s condition, especially when getting such a close look at how extensive the modifications on his body were.

Slowly he moved back into the main training area and awkwardly leaned against the door frame, crossing his arms instinctively to shield himself. It was rather nice to see MacReady exercise, the sportswear looked a lot more fitting on his team leader than on himself from Adam‘s point of view, but soon the rest of the team would arrive and it was going to get really intense. 

„You didn‘t skip Gym class back home did you? Get over here.“

For a few moments they were just staring at each other like the day before in Macs office.

„Since push-ups and squats aren‘t gonna do shit for those aug limbs of yours, why don‘t you start with three sets of twenty regular crunches and fifty reverse crunches to warm up?“ Yes, Duncan had gone through a fitness guide for augmented people so he‘d have an idea how to actually get Adam to feel the burn in the biological parts of his body. No mercy was to be had from him in the gym. No matter if augmented or natural.

Adam grabbed a mat from the stack by the wall near them and got to work. Since his augs essentially kept him at the best possible physical shape, he hadn‘t trained properly in a while, especially core exercises were not exactly something he‘d done often in the last two years. Twenty crunches in, he was already feeling the burn in his abs and grit his teeth.

„That‘s what happens when you rely on your tech too much. Keep going or I‘m gonna put you onto equipment cleaning duty for a month.“ With how smooth and easy Mac was going through his squats, Jensen felt like a clutzy prototype robot next to him. But considering his most recent misdemeanour he couldn‘t really complain that Duncan was treating him like any other agent.

After the second set of crunches it started to be a bit less straining when his sentinel health implant started adjusting his adrenaline levels accordingly. The last set of reverse ones had him silently cursing a few times but Adam got through them. Just when he‘d been about to lay down flat and recover for a bit, he was startled out of his sense of accomplishment by a sharp order from MacReady.

„Now you‘re gonna join me for some yoga. Get moving!“

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  
By the time the rest of the team was arriving, Adam was a sweaty, panting mess on the floor. It wasn‘t a complete surprise that MacReady was so proficient at yoga, he had a lot of health, fitness and sports magazines strewn all over his office and Adam had caught him secretly checking scores on various matches on his analysis board more than once. But it still managed to take him by surprise that Mac could hold a back-bending headstand without shaking even a little or letting out any sounds of pain.

„Morning team! Get yourselves warmed up and once we‘re all on the same page I‘ll fill you in on today‘s schedule. Move out!“ Since everybody except for Adam had been attending the gym sessions, they knew what was expected of them and what Duncan‘s quirks were. The agents scattered throughout the hall and started doing various warm up exercises while curiously watching their team leader get Jensen some water out of the corner of their eyes.

Duncan was not a sadist. Sure, he did feel some satisfaction at seeing Adam get worked over hard like the other agents in his team. But that didn‘t mean that he would risk injuring the aug or make him feel unwelcome in his team. At least not any more than usual. He was working on it, okay? After making sure Jensen was hydrated and not keeling over, he moved to address the the whole team again.

„Listen up, today we are going through some basic CQC- Stop rolling your eyes Dima I can see that! ... Partner up and repeat the ten basic strikes for the first half. After that it‘s free training.“ Not wanting to completely put Adam into the deep end on the first day, he motioned him to come over, deciding it was better to personally train with him for now until the rest of the team had gotten used to his presence here.

„Try and put me on the ground for at least three seconds and swear on your mum that you won‘t mess with my planning again, at least without talking it over with me, and I might be willing to cut your punishment in half.“ That was more than enough motivation to get Adam moving. But even if he had the advantage in raw strength thanks to his augs, Mac was superbly trained in taking down people taller and stronger than him.

In the end Adam did not even have time to notice that he was getting his ass kicked until his head hit the padded mat he‘d been standing on moments before. „Got two more tries. I ain‘t unfair.“

\----------

No, he didn‘t manage to put Duncan on the ground. On his second try he had managed to flip him, but then had ended up in a pretty vicious headlock and tapped out. After training MacReady had invited him over to his place for a change. Meekly nodding his head, Adam accepted. 

Right now he really didn‘t want to piss off the other man, not just because of work, but also because he was starting to really miss having Duncan sleep in the same bed with him. With the mission planning going on their schedules had been too busy to spend more time together lately. Also his pride was hurting a bit at getting floored so easily. Even if it had been while he was in an exhausted state.

Mac‘s apartment was in Prosek, a well-maintained part of District 9. It was only reachable with a natural metro, so they got some scathing looks from the other passengers. One woman even shielded her child‘s eyes. Resisting the urge to flip them the bird, MacReady lead Jensen over to the huge housing complex he called home nowadays.

It wasn‘t quite as sterile as Miller‘s apartment, there was more clutter and various training equipment crammed into most corners, but it was clear that Mac‘s military background had drilled cleanliness into him just as much. Not a speck of dust to be seen anywhere and most things were neatly organized in a way that made sense to Adam's untrained eye.

„Get yourself comfortable. I might still be pissed at ya, but that don‘t mean I‘m gonna punish you for your work fuck-ups in our private life.“ The truth was that Mac had missed sharing a bed, and intimacy in general, with Adam just as much. Now that he had tasted the forbidden fruit again, the desire was a lot harder to suppress than before when work had been the only satisfactory area of his life.

The first thing Jensen did was to turn on his smart vision and scan the general area. No secret rooms. No traps. Just a small storage behind the closet and the usual secret stash hidden in a wall that most modern homes with a smart system had these days.

„Does that mean you‘ll consider letting me blow you?“

That earned him a snort from Mac. „I‘m not a dictator. If you blow me, I‘ll blow right back. This isn‘t supposed to be a one-sided thing, y‘know? We‘ll see where the evenin‘ takes us.“ Reaching for a bottle from one of the kitchen cabinets, Duncan proceeded to pour wine for both of them. He didn‘t have any stronger drinks at home to avoid getting shit faced on them when he was in a bad mood. After having struggled with alcohol problems and a slight battle-stim addiction in the past, the former soldier had put together a strict set of rules for himself regarding all sorts of drugs.

Sitting down on the spacious leather couch, he motioned Adam to join him and handed the other agent the second wine glass once in reach. „Look, I‘m pretty sure you know what you did wrong and that it would be a shit idea to do it again. We don‘t have to talk about that now.. You‘ve been patient with my bad habits so I‘m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt on yours in return.“

Not being prone to emotional outbursts, Adam was surprised at himself when he essentially launched himself at MacReady after setting his wine glass down. Apparently his sub-conscious had suffered a lot more during their lack of intimacy than he‘d allowed himself to notice. The hidden fear of being rejected easing off his shoulders.

Mac ended up having to more or less wrestle Jensen off himself to be allowed to take in some air in-between getting frenched with enough intensity that he actually got a little light-headed. Adam was lying halfway across him and seemed reluctant to stop now that the floodgates of his need for closeness had opened.

„... Message received. But we finish the wine first. It tastes like shit if you leave it out in the open.“


	12. Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for taking so long with this D: I struggled with a bit of writers block and apparently writing porn gets me through it so this chapter is quite raunchy. You have been warneth. 
> 
> For those of you who prefer story progression to wild action: That's gonna have to wait until the next chapter. Sorry :3

Sipping his wine while being watched like prey was definitely a new experience for Duncan. This was probably a social thing, but men flirted and showed their desire for intimacy in whole different ways compared to women, usually. From what he had seen from his ex-wives and other women who had aimed bedroom eyes at him, it seemed that women generally liked to flirt with gestures.

 

Twirling fingers around luscious hair, placing them on parts of their face to draw attention to full lips or sensual eyes... Adam on the other hand was simply looking at him full of intentions and determination. No fiddling around, just raw desire being projected through his eyes.

 

Admittedly, MacReady had no idea how to react to it. Usually he was the one instigating amorous adventures. Should he smile and act coy? Simply act cool? Was he expected to behave in a certain way or was this freestyle? .. Just how much of his learned behaviour was out of date these days? The answer to that was as uncomfortable as the zipper of his dress pants against his crotch right now. Jensen did not throw him coy looks or twirl his hair. He was clearly a man, looking at him with unbridled focus and leaned forward slightly in the armchair he had chosen to get comfortable in. „You look tense.“

 

Mac grimaced a bit and huffed. Why did that damn aug have to be so overly observant? While enjoying the last few drops of his wine, he set down the empty glass and smirked, trying to pokerface through his inner confusion. It was one thing to fool around while being drunk up to the ears or high on adrenaline from some kinky workplace disciplinary action, but another to show his fondness and desire when completely sober. After wrecking his brain for an answer some more he decided to be direct and shrugged his shoulders.

 

„How do I convey that I want to get raunchy with you in the bedroom after some cuddles without it being awkward or too cheesy?“

 

„I‘d say you did just that right now..“ Said Adam‘s disembodied voice. Wait what? A moment later Duncan felt who hands run over his shoulders and grab his pecs through his dress shirt. „Christ mate, Just don‘t tell me you want to fuck me while you‘re camo‘ed up. We ought to save the kinky stuff for when the honeymoon phase is over.“

 

„Actually I was planning to get you nice and relaxed and then break the chain of command.“ The pair of stealthed hands still roaming over his chest was rather distracting and it took Mac a few moments to get the hidden message.

 

Break the chain of command. Oh lord. „You mean, you want to bend me over? Is that it?“ Hearing Jensen chuckle right next to his left ear made the hair on his neck stand up. To be honest, Duncan had thought about the possibility after that rather sensual massage Adam had given him in the private room at the Red Queen. But there was a part of him that was still caught in hesitation.

 

„If you don‘t like what I‘m doing to you, say the safeword. But first, I think we should move somewhere more comfortable.“ MacReady let out a rather embarrassing yelp when he suddenly found himself being lifted up bridal-style by two firm, unyielding metal arms, unable to stop himself from flailing around a bit. „What the heck do you think you‘re doing?!“ 

 

„Moving us somewhere more comfortable.“ The smug tone in that answer made Mac want to lash out with some scathing sarcasm, but after a moment he simply tried his best to relax while being carried over to the bedroom. If Adam really wanted to take charge, here in their private life at least, there wasn‘t really anything speaking against it. They were safe at home and there was no mission, no civilians to be put into jeopardy by them playing around.

 

Not to mention that so far Jensen had respected all of his boundaries and been very accommodating. It wouldn‘t hurt to try out something new, right? „Fine.. Just go easy on me. No more harsh surprises. If you give me a damn heart attack in bed I‘m going to be pissed.“ Of course the cheeky aug had to prod at his pride a little while doing it. „I am going to put you on the bed. _Slowly_.“ Indeed, he was slooooowly moving to the end of the bed to put him there. Nope. Duncan was not having that shit. „Asked ya to be considerate, not to narrate a damn novel. Get a move on-“ That was the moment he was dropped on the bed, face first. „.. Fuck you.“

 

Jensen was taking off his clothes and for a few moments, Duncan was too distracted to continue their flirty bantering while he watched the other man undress over his shoulder. Was he ready to allow such vulnerability around an aug? Why was this such a big deal when he‘d experienced much worse? This couldn‘t be as bad as taking a bullet or missing a jump over a razor-wire fence while dodging grenades. They had both showered in the gym before coming here so there was no need to feel self-conscious about cleanliness either.

 

Rubbing his face a little Mac sighed and made a decision, giving Adam a curt nod and proceeded to shrug off his dress shirt after quickly undoing the buttons and then wriggled out of his pants. „Fine. But if I don‘t like it you drop the case and accept that it‘s not my cup of tea.“ Getting a thumbs up in return, he marvelled at the fact that Adam managed to undress himself in the span of a second. Had this gigantic dork really activated his reflex booster just to undress quicker?

 

Duncan got his answer in the form of Adam wincing a little and quickly grabbing a bio-cell from a coat pocket to plug into the port on his left arm. The other agent had mentioned something about a weird fuzzy sensation when his bio-converter was low on fuel.

 

„You are a gigantic dork. But I still think you‘re hot.“  
  


\------------

 

It didn‘t take long until they were laying on the comfortable double-bed completely naked, facing each other and letting their hands roam, just exploring for now. Mac noted that Adam‘s augs were weirding him out a lot less than last time they were intimate. It seemed he was getting used to them finally. With each moment they spent fondling each other, his curiosity seemed to overshadow his concerns more. What would it feel like to lick over the smooth ridges on Adam‘s wrist joints? Or to trace the small gear-like structures visible at the back of his knees with a finger? Questions that would never have crossed his mind before.

 

Step by step the process of simply viewing the tech as part of Jensen rather than weapons attached to him, evolved into finding new ways to appreciate their unique feel and look. Ghosting a lone fingertip over one of the Typhoon ports above his partner‘s clavicle actually felt like erotic teasing rather than examining a new gun.

 

Seemingly Adam was getting to a point where he felt more comfortable with his current state of being as well, seeing as how Duncan had to tap against the polycarbonate glasses paired with an unhappy grunt to remind Jensen that he should probably retract the shades that were pretty much always present on his face in the bedroom at the very least.

 

„If somebody had told me six months ago I‘d have you between my legs like this I‘d have given them a verbal beatdown.“ Adam glanced up at him while nuzzling his thigh with the side of his face, that beard was a lot softer than expected, and smirked. „And that‘s just the start of it.“ Using his hands to push Duncan‘s legs apart by the knees he gave himself more room to work in as well as a reassuring rub to his thighs. „If you want to stop, you say the safe word. Don‘t try to toughen it out if you feel any pain, It‘s just the two of us.“

 

Feeling nervous, Duncan gave a simple nod rather than a sarcastic reply like he usually would have. It wasn‘t that he feared Adam would hurt him, not really. It was more about the aspect of not being in control and showing his most vulnerable spots that intimidated him about this particular arrangement. Sure, he had fooled around with other men during his days in the regular army, but it had always been very secretive and lucky for him mostly restricted to oral sex.

 

Sensing his unease, Jensen sat back on his haunches and looked lost in thought for a moment. „I think I know how to make this less jarring on you.“ One of Adam‘s hands gently nudged his side, signing him to turn over. As a recon and infiltration specialist, Duncan was trained to expect most attacks to come from his field of view. Getting attacked from behind was rare when you were the one instigating a battle with a small covert unit rather than a whole battalion running in guns blazing. Which meant there were less harshly ingrained reflexes in the way while Adam tested his limits.

 

Not to mention that it generally helped his patience a lot when his back got a nice relaxing rub before any action happened. MacReady‘s eyes being focused on the pillow in front of his face rather than every movement happening also happened to be a positive factor and if he flinched a little when the massage oil was being dripped onto the small of his back, it was because it happened to be a bit cold rather than fearful surprise. Getting kneaded like a loaf of bread was one of his favourite non-work activities. 

 

„Are you really going to make me smell like a strawberry field when I still need to appear in the office later today? Jim is gonna to give me so much shit..“ Apparently yes, because he heard a small huff that by now he knew to be Adam‘s stealth-laugh just before more of the sweet-scented massage oil was being dribbled all over his back. Cheeky bastard. But Jensen sure did give amazing massages so his cheekiness in bed could be forgiven. Especially when Adam did that thing with the rounded part of his palm right above that aching knot of muscle strands that had been plaguing him for days now.

 

Working through his tired muscles just hard enough to smoothen out knots but gentle enough to keep his bones from complaining was definitely a very good way to earn points in Mac‘s book. The only problem was that being all comfortable in his skin tended to make Duncan sleepy. Very sleepy. Too sleepy, even. In fact he ended up snoring into the pillow just about when Adam had planned to go further south and was out like a light.

 

For a few moments Jensen simply watched his team leader snooze and murmur unintelligible things into the pillow, amused and in a way strangely touched that Duncan was trusting him enough to fall asleep around him like this. But there was no way he was going to let the older man get away without at least a bit of action after oiling him up so nicely. That massage oil was expensive, even if it smelled cheap.

 

After some gentle prodding to his sides and some squeezes to his backside Mac woke back up with a grunt and blinked a few times. „Oh. Sorry about that..“ Returning his hands to the pair of shapely, strong thighs that they had been working on before the small interruption, Adam chuckled. „I‘m taking it as a compliment, don‘t worry.“ Deciding to step up his game a bit, Jensen oiled his own body up as well and then slowly lowered himself to lay down on Mac. No negative reaction there, so he shifted a little until he could rub his hard cock between the firm glutes his fingers had been digging into moments ago.

 

To say that they were both enjoying themselves was an understatement. After getting over the initial hesitation Duncan started to move his hips back against Adam and reached back to grab at his side, urging him on to move. When they both got a bit too enthusiastic with their movements, Adam ended up slipping between Mac's thighs and had to bite his lower lip, holding still for a moment to keep from coming right then and there when he felt him tense at the new sensation. "Do you want to take this further?" They had more than enough massage oil and time. Also no lack of motivation, it seemed.  
  
"You need a weapon's license for that voice of yours. Yeah, let's give it a try."  
  
It seemed like it was the day of embarrassing noises because even with plenty of warning and reassuring whispers against his ears MacReady ended up letting out a surprised whine at the sensation of having a finger go where no finger had gone before. But no, it didn't hurt. For one because he had rather good control of his muscles and they really were oiled up to the max. The sheets were going to smell of strawberry forever. When no other movement happened, he started getting impatient and moved his hips back a little combined with a short, impatient glare over his shoulder. Apparently that was just what Jensen had been waiting for to continue. It really didn't take all that long until he could stand having three fingers inside, Mac registered with some surprise. While preparing him, Adam had fumbled open a condom wrapper and dutifully rolled it on with his free hand.

 

"I think you're ready."  
  
"No disagreement there.. Get on with it already!" Apparently Adam was not moving fast enough for his lover's liking, because he found himself thrown onto the bed and staring in awe as Duncan climbed onto his lap, carefully sinking down onto his dick with one hand firmly placed on his chest to keep him from moving and the other gripping the base of his own cock. As patient as MacReady could be when he was deployed on a mission, that same patience did not extend to his private life. Groaning at the slight burning sensation that came with being stretched open like this, he still seemed determined to regain some of the control he had given up to Adam and started moving slowly but with purpose, making them both moan loudly.

 

" _Fuck_.. Oh god-" As much as he had hoped that he wouldn't enjoy this to avoid having to deal with the inner conflict that came with it, Duncan was having a jolly good time, to say the least. In this position at least Adam was rubbing right against his most sensitive spots, while the motion of pushing his own body up and down made him feel the small piece of jewellery decorating his more intimate areas every time his nuts moved and he was close to coming already without having touched himself. After shifting a little and slamming his hips down a few more times he couldn't hold it back anymore and came with a shout.

 

Having already been rather tired before, the chemicals his body released after his orgasm didn't exactly wake him up further, and so MacReady carefully climbed off Adam and snuggled in next to him, snoring in a matter of moments. Jensen on the other hand wasn't quite done yet and sighed a little, contemplating if he should risk waking Duncan again. In the end he handled his raging erection by himself, making use of the fact that his augmented eyes could play back the sight of Mac riding him like a porno. But he did take off the condom and came all over the fuzzy chest hair his boss sported to spite him a little for falling asleep on him twice before laying down as well.  
  
Adam had never claimed that he always behaved perfectly mature.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta reading was done by techno4tomcats who also gave me helpful hints :) Give 'em some lovin', they got a wonderful story of their own featuring this pairing if don't know it yet~


	13. Roll Call

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Those poor agents had no idea what they were in for..

The first thing Duncan noticed upon waking from his short nap was that his chest hair was sticking to the blanket thanks to a not unimpressive amount of cum. It took some delicate tugging to separate his fuzz from the covers and he shot the sleeping aug next to him a dirty look. Seeing how Adam was still snoozing it went unseen and uncommented though. "You little shit.." Another time he might have retaliated with something equally immature but their bedroom antics had provoked his bad leg into hurting which always made him feel far older than he actually was.

Getting up and limping over to the bathroom, Mac went for a quick splash under the shower that helped soothe some of his aches, his sore ass included, before he decided to trim back his beard. Adam had been careful with him but aside from that it had still been the first time he'd let anyone put something up there. But aside from dull pain when he bend over or sat down with too much vigor there weren't too many noticeable repercussions from their passionate bed gymnastics. 

They still had enough time before his alarm clock went off and he was starting to look far too unruly for his orderly sensibilities. The electric razor made quick work of the wool jungle on his face but after checking his now trimmed beard some more in the mirror and eyeing his old straight razor that he still hadn't thrown away out of sentiment, Mac decided to go further.

He wasn't getting any younger or more charming, so he might as well try and look good if this was actually going to end up with him not being single anymore, right? His wives had always complained about his stubble scratching them. Might be worth a try after all. His hands quickly went through the practised motions of lathering up the shaving soap and covering his face in the foam with the expensive boar-bristle brush his father had bought him when he had started growing facial hair way back then.

Even though MacReady hadn't actually shaved his face smooth in more than two years his hands still remembered every detail it involved. Muscle memory was a strong anchor, especially for him. Starting on the left side of his face, he gently scraped off the stubble to reveal the slightly ashen skin underneath. It was going perfectly well until he reached the edges of his scar. Even though he did not actually nick himself it still hurt due to how sensitive the regrown tissue was. The skin had to be pulled taut to shave and that was something that definitely not agreed with the old wound.

But now he couldn't really stop, could he? Going out with a half-shaven face was not an option. Gritting his teeth, Mac managed to scrape off the rest of his stubble and put some of the lidocaine gel he always had in his mirror cabinet on the aching skin to numb it. Giving the stuff a few moments to work, he then resolved to brushing his teeth. After kissing Adam he always felt there was second-hand smoke in his mouth. They would need to have a talk about that.

Quite domestic, that sort of thinking.

"I'm starting to worry that you are secretly a masochist, you know? I'm totally fine with you not shaving your face if it hurts you. You look handsome to me either way."

Not having expected Adam to stand in the doorframe watching him with a smirk, flattering him nonetheless, Mac ended up dropping the toothbrush and glared. Not that it was particularly effective while he was naked and had a bubbling mouthful of toothpaste.

" _Fugg ophf!_ "

\-----

 

After Mac was done freshening up, he let Adam have free reign of his bathroom and prepared a quick snack for them both. Hard boiled-eggs, steamed broccoli and some sauce hollandaise for himself and some cereal for Jensen since the other man had just given him a blank look when he'd offered to make him some proper food. Apparently it was too early for wholesome food when going after the aug's messed up schedule.

 

"I'll be doing an official roll call and introduction at Organized Crime today. I've been talking to Jim and if you are willing I would go ahead and sanction you doing the deputy duty. Keeping an eye on how the folks there are doing, handle day to day dealings and if anything big comes up relay it to me, yeah?" It felt both weird and wonderful to be having a work conversation at home over his breakfast. With his ex-wives he had never really been able to share much since they had all been civilians, save for one. But even with his recently divorced ex-wive who was also a part of TF29, things had not even closely been as chummy as this. Especially since in his experience most women were NOT morning people and lethal when talked to until their first coffee/beverage of choice.

"I can do that. Just a heads up, they have been without real leadership for a long time.. Black was undercover pretty much all of the time. Agent Rizzo took over when needed but she isn't really trained for that." The agents there were used to working on their own. MacReady on the other hand liked to keep a tight fist around his assets, pun intended, and preferred a military etiquette above standard office socializing and gossip.

Things were going to be tense at first. That was about as sure as the fact that night was dark.

"Thanks for the warning .. I'll try to be a bit more lenient than usual at first, but they need to learn structure if they want to do efficient work under my supervision."

That was at least something. It wasn't like Jensen was going to ask Mac to throw his principles overboard. But unlike the Counter-Terrorism troop, those agents had no idea what they were in for with him as their department head. Adam had been just as clueless when he'd first arrived in Prague. But he had a hard shell and was a diligent worker, more than enough to survive some drilling from the former military man.

Some of the guys in Organized Crime weren't quite as durable. One of the women was a former news reporter who had been drawn in because of her investigation skills. A tough woman, no question about it, but still a civilian with no idea how to deal with Mac's harsh military regimen.

Feeling more than adequately refreshed and sated for now they started to get ready for their trip back to the HQ. When they were just about to leave the apartment, Mac stopped and gave himself an irritated sniff. His nose had picked up a scent that was unusual..

"I still smell like fucking strawberries! You bastard."

At least Adam had the decency to hide his laugh behind a small cough.  
  
\---

When they arrived at the office there was immediately an onslaught of whispering and more or less subtle stares in their direction as soon as people noticed that MacReady was actually shaven clean for once. Nobody here had seen that before except for Jim Miller and Miloslava Doubek, his most recent ex-wife. But she was not at HQ like usually around this time of the day, being the Law-Expert and Legal Mediator for the Task Force meant that she was often in court settling disputes with the government and/or local police force who tended to be far less cooperative than they should.

After Duncan had quickly checked in with Aria and organized a small reconnaissance trip to the outskirts of the city for their two rookies, György Kecskeméti and Iosif Antonescu, he moved over to the office space that was shared between the Organized Crime and Cyber Crime Departments. Adam and Aria followed, hoping to step in if things got too rough. They both knew their boss well enough to foresee some issues.

Neither of them had thought it would reach this magnitude though.

MacReady was already very unhappy when stepping through the doorway since nobody took notice that he had walked in. Not even a single greeting to be heard. He was well respected among all of the staff, even if some disliked his strictness, but this sort of ignorance was definitely new to him. Waiting a few more moments to be fair and give them a chance, he then pulled his service pistol from his coat and proceeded to load a blank cartridge, firing a round up against the ceiling. The bright flashes from the muzzle along with the noise seeming even louder than usual in the small underground space the HQ was in.

People startled, some dropped things and Chang let out a rather embarrassing squeak from the other side of the room. Heads turned, many eyes widened in shock and Adam had to summon every bit of self-restraint he had not to smack his hand against his forehead in exasperation.

"I can see that Black didn't teach you proper manners! When your superior walks in and stands in the doorway, especially first time in the morning, you get up and form a line so they can see every single one of your sorry mugs." Putting the gun back into his coat after ejecting the blank magazine he motioned them to get moving.

"When I walk in again I better see a line of agents or you'll be making acquaintance with my special gym training course for the next three hours, is that clear?"

If this was Mac's version of being lenient, Jensen really didn't want to see what being really strict would be.

Doing as he said, Duncan marched out and waited a few second before coming back in through the doorway to throw a sharp gaze around the office. As soon as he was in, the agents scrambled to assemble a line. It wasn't straight and not sorted by rank but at least it was something. Duncan gave a pleased nod and gave every one of them a visual once-over. People who didn't understand his antics thought he was being a jerk living out toxic alpha-male dominance with enforcing this sort of thing, but it actually did serve a purpose.

This roll call allowed him to get a visual of every agent working under him and make sure nobody was visibly ill, troubled or otherwise in need of personal attention without him noticing. It might be tiresome to follow Mac's protocol at times, but the guy did know what he was doing. Unlike Vincent Black he was somebody who actually put effort into leading their department and made sure things were running as smoothly as possible.

Agent Bourke carefully raised a hand to catch their bosses attention.

"We're not in school, Bourke. If you want something, use your words. What is it?"

The man looked a bit taken aback by the blunt, direct attitude aimed at him, but then managed to put his thoughts into the shape of spoken language. "How are we supposed to know what you expect from us? None of us were in the military or worked with you before."

There were some murmurs of agreement from the other agents.

"The short answer? Common sense, following directions and being observant. You knew I was going to take over this department for a while since Miller send out a chain-mail, so you bunch could have bothered to talk to your fellow agents in the Counter-Terrorism unit about what to expect. You are agents of Interpol, not factory workers who ought to be told everything, right? Now I need the most experienced of you to deliver an inventory, status and HR report so I can get things flowing in the right direction and we don't end up ballbagged before we even get started."

The blank stares he got in return were not exactly helping his mood any.

"Sir? If you would allow me I could work on protocol with OC. You and Jensen need to talk to the perp we got in the holding cell before we are legally obliged to release him without new evidence." Aria was both making a good point and saving them all some grief.

"Fair enough. Argento work them in and show them some of the ropes. Report in three hours since I'm feeling generous. Jensen, you come along."

Adam sighed a little and threw a look back at the still shell-shocked agents before following his partner. Aria was a blessing to them all. For a few moments the aug had considered trying out his social enhancer on MacReady to talk him down a bit, but he wasn't sure it would work since C.A.S.I.E. couldn't even get a read on him most of the time due to his erratic chemical imbalance and unstable moods. It was something he had been meaning to bring up but hadn't found the right approach yet.

"So, we are finally talking to the guy?"

Changing the topic seemed like a good idea for now.

"Yeah. If there is one thing I know about squeezing info from perps, it's that the longer you do nothing at all and leave them stewing in a cell the more unsure they get. It freaks them out if you don't do what they expect and twirl their nipples between neon-coated clamps, or what else people do these days."

Before they actually moved over to the cell that held Bartolomej Novak, the human trafficker that Adam had incapacitated on his dangerous solo initiative a while ago, they moved to the security room. MacReady studied their captive on the monitor for a bit and then looked over to Adam.

"We are going to do the classic good cop, bad cop. Except I want you to act neutral for the most part unless I say something outrageous, yeah? This guy isn't gonna fall for being buttered up. So I'm gonna be extra bad. We're shifting the standard margins, so to speak."

There was a moment of silence. Novak likely had important info that could lead to ground-breaking new leads and deployments. But guys that high up in the Mafia food-chain usually were especially hard to crack.

"Can you handle that? If you'd rather not, I can ask Hantz or Strickland to assist."

Interrogation wasn't everybody's cup of tea and Mac respected that. But Adam had a lot of experience with it and some would say he had a knack for it, even without Casie.

"I'll be fine. Let's go in."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wheeeee I finally did it c: Apologies for the wait. Next chapter is gonna have some more action again~


End file.
